China must avoid ‘blind competition’ within high-speed railway network development to maintain ‘reasonable’ debt levels
- China’s 38,000km high-speed rail network is already the world’s largest, with plans to add 3,700km of rail lines in 2021 compared with 4,933km last year
- But authorities are worried about an increasing debt level, with 5.57 trillion yuan (US$850 billion) owed by the state-owned China State Railway Group alone
China’s high-speed railway network development plan must avoid “blind competition” from local authorities to keep debt at a “reasonable” level, the State Council has warned.
“Some local governments prefer high-speed railways to ordinary-speed ones, and often ignore returns. Meanwhile, railway enterprises face high operational pressure and high debt burden,” said China’s State Council on Monday.
“Except for ones with national strategic significance, it is necessary [for railway projects] to be financially sustainable. We must avoid blind competition, obsolete and redundant construction.”
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1,000 railway workers change nearly 2km of track in six hours in northeast China
It added that while the proportion of high-speed and ordinary-speed lines should be optimised, cargo and passenger transport should also be well coordinated.