North-to-South Grain Transport Enters the Era of Dedicated Bulk Grain Trains
On November 11, a train that departed from Qujiadian Station in Liaoning and was fully loaded with corn from Northeast China pulled into the Jinxia Grain Logistics Center at Xianing Port in Changsha, Hunan. This marks the full opening of the corridor connecting China's two major grain production and sales regions in the north and south, and China's grain logistics has officially entered the era of dedicated bulk grain trains.
In recent years, as development between regions has become uneven and demand in the southern market has increased, the long-established pattern of “transporting grain from the south to the north” is being replaced by “transporting grain from the north to the south.” To this end, China is vigorously advancing the “North-to-South Grain Transport” strategy, and the Jinxia Grain Logistics Center has become a strategic node in the southern region. It is understood that China's annual interprovincial grain circulation currently stands at about 200 million tons, of which the Northeast region alone accounts for 57 million tons.
According to Yang Yongsheng, president of the Hunan Grain Group, as a major pig-breeding province, Hunan has a huge annual demand for feed ingredients such as corn. “This ‘North-to-South Grain Transport’ route has an annual transport volume of 600,000 tons and will effectively solve the problem of unbalanced demand between the northern and southern grain production and sales regions, and ease the production and sales conflicts caused by seasonal factors and regional differences.” Yang Yongsheng said.
Bulk grain is a concept corresponding to packaged grain, while a dedicated bulk grain train is a fully enclosed train that can only be used to transport grain, with loading and unloading both controlled mechanically. The reporter learned that in the past, unloading a train of packaged grain required 200 workers and 2 hours, while a dedicated bulk grain train can complete the task in just a few minutes, and the reduced loss and cost per ton of grain can save about 100 yuan.