Rail freight rises amid steady economy

China's railway network transported 3.03 billion metric tons of cargo in the first three quarters of 2025, up 3.4 percent year-on-year, the national railway operator China State Railway Group said on Thursday.

On average, 185,300 train cars were loaded each day during the period, an increase of 4.3 percent from a year earlier. The railway operator said the continued optimization of logistics products and more efficient transport organization have played a key role in ensuring smooth domestic and international circulation and supporting stable economic growth.

The company has stepped up efforts to deepen market-oriented freight reform and improve service quality, in line with national strategies to build a modern logistics system and reduce logistics costs.

Efficient transport of key goods has been prioritized. From January to September, railways carried 1.55 billion tons of coal, including 1.06 billion tons for power generation, helping maintain ample coal supplies for power plants.

Intermodal transport has also expanded, with 12.78 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) of containers handled under rail-water combined transport, up 16.9 percent. The railway's digital freight platform now hosts 143,000 trucks, achieving 242 million tons of rail-road combined transport.

Meanwhile, cross-border freight remained stable. In the first nine months, China-Europe freight trains made 14,500 trips, while trains to Central Asia totaled 10,800, up 22.8 percent year-on-year. The China-Laos Railway carried 4.13 million tons of cross-border cargo, a 10.4 percent increase, further bolstering international trade links.