Completion of the Qinghai-Tibet railway will bring the hinterland region into China's national railroad network, substantially increase inbound and outbound cargo shipping from the region by slashing transport cost, and help attract more tourists from outside Tibet, say researchers with the Research Institute of Industrial Economy under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and the Tibetan Academy of Social Sciences.

The railway will provide fine infrastructure for the sustainable development of Tibet and create conditions for the industrial restructuring of the region, according to research reports about the influence of the project on the social and economic development of Tibet.

With an area of 1.2 million square kilometers and an average altitude of more than 4,000 meters, Tibet is dubbed the roof of the world and under-developed economically mainly because of a transport bottleneck, as it is China's only provincial region with no access to railways.

Liu Kai, a researcher from the CASS Research Institute of Industrial Economy, says that the quicker the regional economy develops, the more it will rely on transport links with the outside world.

Tibet now suffers huge costs for highway transport.

"Construction of the railway will help cut transport costs, lower commodities prices and activate consumption in Tibet," said Wang Taifu, with the Research Institute of Economic Strategy under the Tibet Regional Academy of Social Sciences.

It will also help local enterprises to explore markets both at home and abroad and aid overseas enterprises entering the region, Wang says.

Wang predicts that by 2010, Tibet will handle 2.8 million tons of cargo annually, of which 2.1 million tons will be transported by train.

By 2010, 1.8 million tourists are predicted to visit Tibet a year, and 630,000 will travel by rail.

The Qinghai-Tibet railway, from Xining, capital city of northwest China's Qinghai Province, to Lhasa, capital city of Tibet, will traverse 1,925 kilometers. Its 815-km section from Xining to Golmud of Qinghai opened to traffic in 1984. Construction of the 1,080-km section from Golmud to Lhasa started in late June 2001. The main part of the project is scheduled for completion at the end of this year.