Page 24 - Port of Hamburg Magazine - 02.19

■ HAMBURG AND CHINA
SEA: Distance: 20,053 km | Time 32 days Cost: 2,410 USD/FEU
24 | Port of Hamburg Magazine | June 2019
China’s New Silk Road –
An opportunity for trade but a real challenge for politics
In his guest editorial, Professor Gabriel Felbermayr Ph.D, who has been President of the Institute for the World Economy in Kiel since March this year, casts light on the opportunities and risks created by the New Silk Road. The internationally renowned trade expert specializes in his research and consulting work on questions of economic global economic governance, European economic integration and German economic policy.
Economic research is proving more and more that defi- cient or lacking infrastructure is decidedly more impor- tant for putting a brake on world trade than the remain- ing – and even the new – customs barriers.
China has recognized the signs of the times and is investing tremendous sums in Asia, Europe and Afri- ca. Through the Belt and Road Initiative – BRI – a tril- lion dollars are to be invested in infrastructure pro- jects. The New Silk Road project has no lesser ambition than to create a Eurasian economic zone stretching from the Yellow Sea on the east coast of China to the Atlantic. It will encompass 92 countries with some 4.6 billion people and an economic out- put of 50 trillion dollars annually, or almost 60 percent of world gross national product.
Add to this that the continent of Africa also plays an important
role in the BRI planning.
On average, transport costs (including insurance) cur- rently amount to some eight percent of the value of goods in EU-China trade. If you could halve this, and applying customary trade elasticity, the long-term growth in goods trading could lie between around 25- 30 percent. We are talking here of additional trade amounting to 200 billion euros and more, each and every year in the future. The Belt and Road Initiative has the potential for that. It could transform Eurasian trade.
Currently, this is almost entirely by sea, with a smaller quantity carried by air. Rail transport does not even reach three percent of goods traded between the EU
and China. However, the overland route is gaining in importance. In the period between 2014–2017 the EU’s China trade has increased its value five-fold by rail, while the total goods trade has increased by almost 20 percent. In comparison to sea
cargo, rail transport from Shanghai on the Chinese east coast to Ham-
burg takes half as long, is ecologically more
advantageous and is much cheaper than
airfreight.
The precise transit times and costs de- pend on each point of origin and destination within China and Europe, as well as the goods transported. In addition, they are subject to considera- ble temporal fluctuations – both seasonal and cyclical. The comparison (see graphic) for transporting a 40-foot container (1 FEU = 2 TEU) from Shanghai to Hamburg in June/July 2017 can therefore only give a rough ori-
entation.
Strengthening freight transport by rail is politically de- sirable. Major subsidies by various central Chinese re- gional governments, abolishing customs borders be- tween Kazakhstan, Russia and Belarus, the introduction of standardized (end-to-end) CIM/SMGS consignment note for freight traffic between China and Europe, as well as local improvements for customs clear- ance have contributed to a reduction in transport costs and transit times.
Until today, from the corporate side it has above all been the electronics and automotive industries search- ing for more cost efficient, faster and more reliable ways of transporting between new production plants in Central China and customers or suppliers in Europe. They gave the impetus for establishing new rail freight