Freight traffic across the cross-border bridge in the Jewish Autonomous Region is set to grow significantly following the results of the Eastern Economic Forum.

The Russian company IFR-1 and Gugaer Multimodal Transport (Liaoning) Co., Ltd. (China) signed a memorandum of intent on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum to launch regular rail freight services across the cross-border bridge over the Amur River in the Jewish Autonomous Region.

The declared guaranteed volume of containerized cargo shipments is 10 million tons per year. The cargo mix includes: cement (2 million tons), metal products and construction materials (0.2 million tons), automobiles (2 million tons), small household appliances (0.4 million tons), light industry goods (0.6 million tons), consumer goods (0.5 million tons), machinery and equipment (1.8 million tons), automated equipment (1 million tons), as well as agricultural machinery and equipment (1 million tons). Deliveries are also planned for about 1 million tons of gasoline, diesel fuel, and LPG from a petrochemical terminal on the Russian side.

In addition, the parties plan to organize regular transit rail shipments from Russia to China totaling 5.7 million tons annually.

Earlier reports noted that the cross-border Amur bridge in the Jewish Autonomous Region consistently handles freight traffic of about 0.5 million tons per month.

As part of the goal set by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping to expand bilateral trade, Oleg Belozerov, CEO of Russian Railways (RZD), proposed during his June 2024 meeting with Liu Zhenfang, Chairman of the Board of China Railway (CR), to double train traffic across the cross-border bridge.

Currently, freight traffic across the Amur bridge stands at up to 10 trains per day in each direction.