Photo shows a cargo train from Northwest China's Qinghai province waiting for departure at a station in Southwest China's Chongqing municipality on March 10, 2020. Chongqing launched a special cargo train service on Tuesday for epidemic-hit export enterprises in West China via its land-sea freight route. [Phptp by Huang Wei/Xinhua]

Southwest China's Chongqing municipality launched a special cargo train service on Tuesday for epidemic-hit export enterprises in west China via its land-sea freight route.

A cargo train, carrying 50 containers of sodium carbonate, departed Chongqing on Tuesday for Qinzhou in South China's Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region before they will be shipped to Bangkok of Thailand.

"In the special period amid novel coronavirus outbreak, the new train service can help epidemic-hit enterprises which have resumed production in West China," said Li Tiejun, executive deputy general manager of Qinghai Wucai Alkali Industry Co, the producer of the sodium carbonate.

Li said the new transportation mode will cut the procedure of changing containers when goods are transported from land to sea, which can save logistics cost and time and reduce damages during cargo transportation.

The land-sea route is part of the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor, a trade and logistics passage jointly built by western Chinese provincial regions and Singapore under the framework of the China-Singapore (Chongqing) Demonstration Initiative on Strategic Connectivity.

Chongqing is a center of operation for the corridor, with goods from western Chinese provinces and regions shipped to the Beibu Gulf in Guangxi before they are transferred to other parts of the world along sea routes.

By Feb 29, the land-sea freight route had seen a total of 1,674 trips, transporting $910 million worth of goods, such as cars and auto parts, architectural ceramics, chemical raw materials and products.