Chinese modernization: Forging a path of openness across mountains and seas

In September 2017, the first train on the "southward corridor," spanning from Chongqing through Guizhou and Guangxi to Singapore and serving as a precursor to the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor, departed from southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. Lyu Sixiang, a young man from Chongqing, was among the first to drive on this route. His mentor, Jiang Tong, was the driver of the very first train to run on the Chongqing-Xinjiang-Europe railway, the pioneering China-Europe freight train route. Now, with one heading west and the other south, this mentor-mentee duo is steering trains along pathways of openness that connect Chongqing to the world.

Chongqing shoulders the vital task of driving China's westward opening up. In August 2019, China's National Development and Reform Commission issued a master plan for the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor, elevating the project from a local initiative to a national strategy. The plan positioned Chongqing as the corridor's core logistics and operations hub.

Expanding opening up is a strategic vision laid out by Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, for the development of China's western region. In April 2024, during an inspection tour in Chongqing, Xi pointed out that the construction of this corridor is of great significance to promoting the formation of an opening-up pattern featuring "building connections with other countries over land and sea while facilitating mutual assistance between eastern and western regions."

Starting from Chongqing, this international logistics corridor now reaches over 120 countries and regions around the world. As its reach extends, trade volumes grow, and industrial cooperation deepens, the corridor is fast becoming a key platform for writing a new chapter in Belt and Road cooperation.