Beijing inaugurated yesterday, September 16, a new 134-kilometer-long canal intended to reduce transport distances between the country’s southwest and Southeast Asia. The project, which links Nanning, the capital of Guangxi, to the Gulf of Tonkin, is the first river-to-sea canal constructed in China since the founding of the People’s Republic in 1949.
- The construction began in August 2022 as part of the establishment of a new “International Land-Sea Trade Corridor” (国际陆海贸易新通道).
- The project’s stated cost is 73 billion yuan (about €9.4 billion), i.e., roughly €70 million per kilometer — 1.5 times cheaper than the expansion of the Suez Canal, completed in 2015 (€106 million per kilometer).
- The Pinglu Canal will be able to accommodate ships with a capacity of up to 5,000 tonnes, and should shorten the voyage of goods to the sea by more than 560 kilometers.
The canal is expected to significantly reduce transport costs for Chinese producers, and could lead to a substantial rise in trade with ASEAN countries.
The bloc, which includes 11 Southeast Asian nations, is already China’s main trading partner, ahead of the European Union and the United States.
- Chinese authorities believe that strengthening these ties would also help energize Guangxi, whose coastline — Qinzhou, Fangchenggang, Beihai… — is, unlike other coastal Chinese provinces, less economically developed than the interior of the region, particularly Nanning and Liuzhou.
- In this sense, the Pinglu Canal fits within a doctrine that dates back to dynastic China with the construction of the Grand Canal. Spanning nearly 1,800 kilometers, the Grand Canal remains the longest in the world and is still partially used by ships.
The Pinglu Canal is part of a series of megaprojects currently under study in China.
- The most ambitious is the Zhejiang-Jiangxi-Guangdong Canal, which, at nearly 2,000 kilometers, would be even longer than the Grand Canal. It would connect the Yangtze River to the Pearl River via Lake Poyang, providing direct access between the Yangtze River Delta and the Greater Bay Area (Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao).
- The Xianggui Canal, which would connect Pinglu to the Yangtze River, is already under study. A delegation from Hunan had proposed including the project in the 15th Five-Year Plan, adopted in March, but it was ultimately not selected.
- Other interior provinces, including Hubei and Henan, have embarked on additional projects, such as the Jinghan Canal, intended to realign a stretch of the Yangtze.