New Land Grain Corridor bolsters food security

The New Land Grain Corridor, proposed by Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2016 and supported by the Chinese leadership, was launched with the intention of creating the world's first specialized railway grain terminal. Its objective is to enhance food security of both countries by establishing a robust Russian-Chinese grain corridor, while facilitating trade and fostering economic cooperation.

Today, the project has developed into a large-scale program and a practical implementation of win-win cooperation.

The New Land Grain Corridor Group is a collection of companies engaged in the development of grain production and infrastructure in Russia, utilizing the contract farming model. Its service network covers the Urals, Siberia, and the Far East. According to the company, the contract farming instrument is based on long-term contracts with farmers, ensuring that only products demanded by the market will be cultivated. Contracts are made with a 50 percent advance payment of the annual supply cost, with full agricultural support, and the pricing is determined by a fair formula.

The group is projected to reach the production potential of 32 million hectares of arable land in the Urals, Siberia and the Far East, and be capable of producing 30 million metric tons of grain per year by 2025. By 2035, its production capacity will be increased to 90 million tons per year, of which more than 70 million tons shall be supplied to friendly countries, according to the company.

The New Land Grain Corridor is an infrastructure of hub elevators and transport terminals being constructed along the main railway lines for the accumulation of grain and provides uniform year-round supplies. Cross-border grain and multimodal terminals create full-scale logistics hubs that provide for the loading and supply of grain in one direction and the delivery of a wide range of goods from China in the opposite direction.

The New Land Grain Corridor Group has introduced the concept of "Grain+", an initiative aimed at containerizing inland grain transportation. The concept primarily focuses on establishing an efficient logistics system to maximize the loading capacity of railway vehicles between China and Russia, considering the difference in track gauges. It also introduces a new technological process for managing cargo flows across different modes of transport, specifically addressing various types of cargo at a multimodal, cross-border transport and logistics hub.

On the Russian-Chinese border, two facilities will operate under the concept of "Grain+": the Grain Terminal Zabaikalsk, with a capacity of up to 8 million tons per year and over 6 million tons of return cargo per year, and a terminal near the Nizhneleninskoye-Tongjiang bridge crossing, designed in cooperation with the Chinese State-owned corporation China Cheng Tong Holdings Group. Similar hubs are planned on the border of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Turkmenistan, as well as other regions.

To ensure the smooth operation of the "Grain+" logistics model, Russia and China have joined hands to develop and manufacture a new type of rolling stock that can carry specially designed grain containers. These rolling stocks form the basis for the Land Grain Fleet created by the Grain Terminal Zabaikalsk, which can handle up to 8 million tons of grain at a time during the initial stage. The capacity of the fleet will be increased to 39 million tons of grain.

It will be possible to significantly boost the efficiency of goods turnover across the border and transportation along the Trans-Siberian Railway, nearly doubling the overall capacity, according to the company.

The next step in the development of the New Land Grain Corridor program is the signing of an intergovernmental agreement between Russia and China, which will provide legal support from both countries. This work is already in progress.