A freight train departs from Zhongding Logistics Park in Shanxi province for Vientiane, capital of Laos, on July 30. [Photo/Shanxi Daily]

North China's Shanxi province launched an international freight train via the China-Laos Railway on July 30. 

Loaded with locally produced goods such as ceramic products, coatings and fertilizers, the train departed from Zhongding Logistics Park in the provincial capital Taiyuan for Vientiane, capital of Laos.

The train will travel through Mohan Port in Southwest China's Yunnan province, which borders Laos, before arriving at its destination in seven days. 

To ensure the successful operation of the freight train, China Railway Taiyuan Group Co and Huayuan International Land Port Group have worked together to give full play to the role of Shanxi Jinou Logistics Co as an international freight train operation platform, contact manufacturers and international trade enterprises in the province, and gather the sources of international freight trains on the China-Laos Railway. 

This successful operation signals that logistics channels between Shanxi and ASEAN countries have been expanded and will have a positive and far-reaching impact on helping Shanxi manufacturing go global and deepening international economic and trade exchanges. 

Since it was put into operation in December 2021, the 1,035-kilometer China-Laos Railway from Kunming in Yunnan province to Vientiane in Laos has helped facilitate travel between the two countries and built a convenient logistics channel between China and ASEAN member countries, making railway transportation cheaper and quicker.