New view for Finland-China freight train service discussed

The possibility that rail transport offers to the shipments of salmon from Norway via Finland to China was one of the new topics discussed at the fourth Railforum conference in Kouvola, southeastern Finland on Thursday.

Kouvola is a rail junction that has become the Finnish starting point for rail transit to Xi'an, northwestern China.

Ola Strand, CEO of Norwegian company BluWrap, has developed a package that can keep salmon fresh for as long as 30 days. He told newspaper Kouvolan Sanomat that "tons of salmon" could be on the way in the near future.

At the moment, some 30,000 tons of Norwegian salmon is airfreighted to China, Strand said. He underlined to Kouvolan Sanomat that the cost of rail transport is 80 percent less than by air.

Hannu Makinen, director general of Finnish Customs, said at the seminar in Kouvola that the Finnish authorities will do their best to get the required permits for transporting food products on the train.

Discussing the competitive edge of the Kouvola-Xi'an route, Makinen said that the railroad connection from China to Western Europe is busy with high usage rate, "so this northern route is a potential alternative."