The China-Vietnam train has become a convenient passage for Thai and Vietnamese fruit to enter the Chinese market, officials from China Railway Nanning Group announced on July 1.

A total of 38,000 metric tons of Thai and Vietnamese fruit was exported to China via the China-Vietnam train in the first half of 2022, an increase of 164.95 percent year-on-year.

On Feb 25, 2020, the General Administration of Customs approved Pingxiang Checkpoint in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region to be qualified as a designated inspection site for imported fruit, and the first batch of Vietnamese fruit was imported.

Pingxiang Checkpoint has imported 73,293 tons of fruit as of right now, including Thai durians, mangosteens, and Vietnamese lychees. The fruit was then swiftly supplied to local cities like Zhengzhou, Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Beijing.

According to Huang Shuwei, general manager of Guangxi Wuhua International Trade, rail transport can match the high demands of fruit transportation while saving close to two-thirds the time required for customs clearance compared to other transport methods.

A total of 173 China-Vietnam trains were put into operation in the first half of 2022, dispatching 5,196 twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU) containers, each climbing by 19.3 percent and 26.3 percent, posing sound and stable growth.