China's overland Silk Road and Maritime Silk Road Thread

no_name

Colonel
Singapore is not going to like this.

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Thailand and China have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) in Guangzhou last Friday to jointly cut a shipping passage across Kra Isthmus in southern Thailand, the narrowest part of the Malay Peninsula.

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The proposed waterway, named Kra Canal, likened to the maritime shortcuts of the Suez Canal and Panama Canal, will allow ships to bypass the Malacca Strait and ply directly between the Pacific Ocean and Indian Ocean, shortening voyage by some 1,200 km.

The vessel’s voyage would also be reduced by two to five days, and a 100,000-dwt oil tanker could save some $350,000 in bunker fuel costs on a single voyage.

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The ambitious new canal would be 102 km long, 400 metres wide and more than 20 metres deep, potentially a wider two-way maritime passageway than the existing Suez Canal and Panama Canal. Observers said that the Kra Canal’s dimensions would be able to accommodate any types of the present-day large-sized ships, including VLCCs.
Kra-Canal.jpg


The Kra Canal, which would have a significant impact on shipping trade in Southeast Asia pypassing the Malacca and Singapore Straits, would take 10 years to develop at a whopping $28bn. The project could be shortened to seven years but at a higher cost of $36bn if nuclear and other more expensive technologies are used in the construction.

The Kra Canal project will be carried out by the China-Thailand Kra Infrastructure Investment and Development Company.

Thailand’s benefits from the Kra Canal would include toll collection, port fees, foreign investment stimulus, as well as a range of infrastructure developments surrounding the canal.

For China, the project falls as part of its national 21st Century Maritime Silk Road Economic Belt, as Beijing believes that the Kra Canal would help to reduce its cost of importing oil from Africa and the Middle East. It would also provide greater energy and trade security for China with the Middle East and Europe.

Additionally, the project would boost activities at China’s key ports in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Shenzhen, as maritime traffic can skip the port of Singapore, located at the southernmost tip of the Malay Peninsula.

Singapore port, strategically, located along the Malacca Strait, has been benefiting from the busy shipping traffic passing between the Andaman Sea and the South China Sea. The Malacca Strait is one of the world’s busiest international shipping lanes with up to 40% of the world’s trade passing through it.
 

SampanViking

The Capitalist
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I am going to link back to Peter Lee's article for a possible part answer to this.

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The behemoth ore carriers plying the routes from Australia to South Korea and Japan transit through Sunda and Lombok by default and as a matter of necessity. Their drafts are too great to safely transit the Malacca Strait with its 25 meter restriction. And there are a number of “postMalaccamax” ultralarge crude carriers that couldn’t transit Malacca even if they wanted to.

Now I did pick up that the Canal with have a 20m draft, but I do wonder if other ships with other out sized dimensions will fit the canal, but which cannot use the Malacca Straits?
 

delft

Brigadier
The approach to Rotterdam consists of the "Euro-geul" with a depth of 25.4 meters followed by the Maas-geul with 24.3 meters, especially dug out of the North Sea bottom for the large tankers. A Kra canal should have a similar depth. There is of course the matter of tides. Are these especially small in this area?
 

broadsword

Brigadier
Hungary first European country to sign up for China Silk Road plan

POSTED: 07 Jun 2015

BEIJING: Hungary has become the first European country to sign a cooperation agreement for China's new "Silk Road" initiative to develop trade and transport infrastructure across Asia and beyond, China's foreign ministry said late on Saturday.

The countries' foreign ministers signed a memorandum of understanding for what is formally known as the "One Belt, One Road" project in Budapest, according to a statement on the Chinese foreign ministry website.

China welcomes more European countries to look East, and strengthen cooperation with China and other Asian countries, and participate in the "One Belt, One Road" in various ways, said Wang Yi, China's foreign minister, according to a separate statement on the website.

President Xi Jinping said earlier this year he hoped annual trade with the countries involved in Beijing's plan to create a modern Silk Road would surpass US$2.5 trillion in a decade.

Hungary hopes to closely cooperate with China and push on with the Hungarian-Serbia railway and other major construction projects, Hungary's President Janos Ader was quoted as saying by the Chinese foreign ministry.

China is helping fund and build a railway connecting Hungary and Serbia.

Projects under the plan include a network of railways, highways, oil and gas pipelines, power grids, Internet networks, maritime and other infrastructure links across Central, West and South Asia to as far as Greece, Russia and Oman, increasing China's connections to Europe and Africa.

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard and Paul Carsten; Editing by Kim Coghill)
 
New Silk Road Milestone

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Xinjiang launches cargo train service to Moscow

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2015-06-10 23:56:48

URUMQI, June 10 (Xinhua) -- Railway authorities in China's far western Xinjiang region on Wednesday launched a cargo train service linking its regional capital of Urumqi with Moscow.


The one more cargo train service westward can help boost the development of the northwestern autonomous region, a "core area" of the Silk Road economic belt, said Liu Jianxin, vice governor of Xinjiang, at the launch ceremony.

Since March 2014, Xinjiang has opened cargo train service to Kazakhstan, Georgia,
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, Turkey and also Chelyabinsk of
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.

The first train, loaded with 1,300 tonnes of PVC, left Urumqi at 6:15 p.m. and is scheduled to reach Moscow more than 4,000 km away in about ten days. It will return with wood pulp from Russia.

Wang Hongxin, chairman of Xinjiang Zhongtai Chemical Co., Ltd., said the cargo service can help drive the company's annual sales of PVC by 10 percent.

By the second half of the year, more than three cargo trains will run between Xinjiang and the destinations in Russia and also central and western Asia per week.

The trains can then transport 50 billion yuan (8.1 billion U.S. dollars) of cargo a year, Liu said.
 

Quon_Duixote

New Member
Perhaps a slightly perverse aspect of the OBOR is the element of economic coercion in the larger spectrum of geopolitical situation in south Asia. For example the OBOR invests significantly in Pakistan as opposed to India which, perhaps, one can safely assume would pay significantly higher return on capital invested. I don't think this strategy of giving India the miss is going to work out in the long term given india's vast and rapidly maturing markets and a very favorable position (geographically) in south Asia and the IOR. for me, some of these aspects will prevent the OBOR from being successful to the level it envisages!!
 

delft

Brigadier
Perhaps a slightly perverse aspect of the OBOR is the element of economic coercion in the larger spectrum of geopolitical situation in south Asia. For example the OBOR invests significantly in Pakistan as opposed to India which, perhaps, one can safely assume would pay significantly higher return on capital invested. I don't think this strategy of giving India the miss is going to work out in the long term given india's vast and rapidly maturing markets and a very favorable position (geographically) in south Asia and the IOR. for me, some of these aspects will prevent the OBOR from being successful to the level it envisages!!
There is no intention of giving India the miss. The BRICS bank will also contribute to OBOR and has an Indian chief. It is just that the Pakistan complex of projects has been published first. What do you think of the plan to build a high speed railway from Kunming to Dhaka and Kolkata?
 
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