Gashuunsukhait border operates on full capacity

The Gashuunsukhait border crossing has opened all of its railway tracks, enabling around 800 hopper cars to transport coal between Mongolia and China.

This decision was made during Prime Minister U. Khurelsukh’s recent visit to China. Now that six railways have become operational, Mongolian and Chinese governments hope to further expand Gashuunsukhait border crossing and increase the number of passing hopper cars to 1,200.

Following a new bilateral agreement, the Chinese government is investing 148 million RMB, or 23 million USD, to improve the capacity of the border crossing. Accordingly, the Mongolian side expects positive outlook for coal export. In doing so, the Mongolian Cabinet believes that it will be able to achieve its target to export 30 million tons of coal each year.

In 2017, Mongolia’s foreign trade amounted to 10.5 billion USD, 6.7 billion USD of which was attributed to trade with China, according to statistics. Between 1990 and 2017, China invested more than four billion MNT to Mongolia, specifically 70.1 percent of the investment went to geology, mining and exploration, 22 percent went to trade and catering services, and 2.3 percent to the construction sector.

During Prime Minister U. Khurelsukh’s Beijing visit, the two counterparts agreed to advance projects and programs in order to boost trade turnover to 10 billion USD by 2020. The projects will be targeted at strengthening bilateral ties and partnership, eradicating non-tariff difficulties related to trade, boosting production capacity and investment, stimulate economic growth, and improve the livelihood of the public.