DHL expands the China-Europe multimodal rail service
DHL Global Forwarding, Freight announced today new developments in its route offerings between Asia and Europe for intermodal shipments. A true door-to-door service, DHL’s new scheduled block train service offers an average transit time of 14 days from Suzhou to Warsaw along the trans-Siberian North Corridor. “Suzhou is a strategic departure point for Jiangsu and it is a huge benefit for our customers to have direct access to inter-continental rail links rather than having to go via Chengdu. Being able to offer multiple loading points across China creates many opportunities for our customers, which is why we are seeing so much interest in multimodal services,” said Roger Crook, CEO DHL Global Forwarding, Freight.
This expansion complements the existing daily single wagon service from Shanghai to Europe, also along the North Corridor, and the weekly block train service from Chengdu to Europe along China’s West Corridor rail line through Kazakhstan to Europe. The expansion taps on Suzhou’s strategic location within Jiangsu Province, an important production area for engineering, manufacturing, high tech, automotive and the retail sector with growing demand.
“As a flexible solution, this service offers the option of booking variable capacity – ranging from a single container to a whole train. Our customers in both continents benefit from reduced door-to-door lead times and CO2 emissions via an effective transport route that seamlessly connects both our groupage network in Europe and DHL Global Forwarding, Freight’s Asian network,” explains Amadou Diallo, CEO DHL Freight.
Broadly, DHL’s multi-modal rail solution customers can expect delivery time reductions of between 10 and 21 days compared to sea freight, depending on origin and destination pairs. In addition, customers seeking environmentally friendly solutions can also expect a fall of CO2 emissions of up to 90% compared to airfreight.
DHL’s road/rail multimodal service between Asia and Europe combines rail and road transportation modes to link the two continents via its intermodal hub in Małaszewicze, Poland. DHL Global Forwarding, Freight launched the service in July 2010 following the completion of more than 120 successful single container trial shipments. Earlier this year, DHL introduced the first temperature-controlled China-Europe rail service, providing customers with precise climate control of containers, regardless of the weather, on the lane from China to Europe going via the West corridor between Chengdu and Lodz.
Additionally, European customers will soon enjoy even broader access to the Asian market. The company is exploring ways to further expand the network to include Japan and Korea, by using ferry services between the three countries, to enable a faster-to-market approach for all customers and therefore strengthening the footprint in the North Asian multimodal market.
