A distant view of an amusement park in Heihe, Heilongjian, China, on the southern bank of the Amur River, as seen from Blagoveshchensk, Amur Region, Russia. (Photo : Getty Images)
The major trade link between China and Russia will be further enhanced as construction of a cross-border rail bridge received more than 755 million yuan ($110 million) to finance its completion, Chinese officials announced on Monday, Feb. 6.
According to China Daily, the bridge will connect Tongjiang in the northeastern Heilongjiang Province with Nizhneleninskoye in Russia's Jewish Autonomous Oblast. The total investment for its construction is 2.6 billion yuan ($379 million), the government said.
Once completed, the rail bridge, known as the Amur International Rail Bridge or the China-Russia Tongjiang Rail Bridge, is expected to boost bilateral trade between China and Russia as it will serve as a major transportation link in the region where economic activity has been limited by poor transport infrastructure.
The local government said that the latest round of financing was provided by a Sino-Russian joint venture, supported by China Investment Corp, a sovereign wealth fund.
"It means that the financing problem from the Russian side has finally been solved," Zhang Ruohui, an official from the Commerce Department of Heilongjiang Province, said.
The construction of the bridge started in 2014 but funding problems and construction delays by the Russian side have halted construction work.
Wang Jin, the mayor of Tongjiang, said that the bridge will make the city a transport center with Russia and a major link in the China-Mongolia-Russia economic corridor.
"The bridge will help unleash the potential of Tongjiang as a key transportation hub in the region," Wang said, adding that it will also boost the local economy.
The bridge is also expected to improve trade between the two countries and reduce transport costs for businesses. Government data showed that bilateral trade between the two countries reached $69 billion last year.
The bridge project has shown the difficulties that the two countries may face in future partnerships, especially in developing the Far East regions, Xu Tao, a Central Asia studies researcher at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, said.
"Securing funds has long been a hurdle. Insufficient mutual trust and Russian doubts over China's intention to develop the region have been another source of uncertainty for Sino-Russian cooperation," Xu said.
