the investment in fixed assets of transportation completed 1013.8 billion yuan

The Information Office of the State Council held a press conference at 3 p.m. on Tuesday, June 25, 2019. Wu Chuncheng, spokesman of the Ministry of Transport and director of the Policy Research Department, and Cao Desheng, Director of the Maritime Bureau of the Ministry of Transport, introduced the recent economic operation situation of transportation and answered questions from reporters.

The following is a transcript:

Wu Chuncheng: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, friends of the news media! It's a pleasure to meet you here. Thank you for your long-term concern and support for transportation. Next, I would like to introduce to you the transportation and economic operation in the first five months of this year. Since this year, under the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as its core and under the guidance of the socialist ideology with Chinese characteristics in the new era of Xi Jinping, our Ministry has fully implemented the spirit of the Nineteenth Congress of the CPC and the Second and Third Plenary Sessions of the Nineteenth Central Committee, conscientiously implemented the decision-making and deployment of the Central Economic Work Conference and the "Report on Government Work". Tasks of the project should adhere to the general tone of steady progress, new development concepts, high-quality development, supply-side structural reform in accordance with the eight-character policy of "consolidation, enhancement, promotion and unimpeded", deepen market-oriented reform, expand high-level openness, and comprehensively promote stable growth, reform and restructuring. The work of benefiting people's livelihood, preventing risks and ensuring stability has achieved smooth operation of transportation economy, maintained the main indicators in a reasonable range, continued optimization of industry structure, made positive progress in major economic work, and further enhanced the ability to support economic and social development. Specifically, it is mainly reflected in five aspects:

Firstly, the investment in transportation fixed assets has maintained a relatively rapid growth. Since this year, our ministry has vigorously promoted effective investment in transportation, and ensured the high level of investment in transportation fixed assets through early issuance of vehicle tax funds, actively striving for the special debt of toll roads, and speeding up project approval. From January to May, the completed investment reached 1013.8 billion yuan, an increase of 7.3% over the previous year, an increase of 6.6 percentage points over the whole year of last year. Among them, the investment in highway and waterway completion was 753.7 billion yuan, an increase of 4.8%, 41.9% of the annual target of 1.8 trillion yuan, and the progress was accelerated by 1.3 percentage points over the same period; the investment in railway completion was 224.4 billion yuan, an increase of 12.6% over the same period; and the investment in civil aviation construction completion was 35.7 billion yuan, an increase of 39.5% over the same period.

Secondly, the passenger transport structure continues to optimize. In May, 1.45 billion people completed business passenger traffic. Among them, railway and civil aviation passenger traffic increased rapidly, increasing by 14.8% and 8.7%, highway passenger traffic decreased by 4.2%, waterway passenger traffic increased by 1.6%. From January to May, the number of passenger traffic completed was 7.33 billion, down 1.8% from the same period last year. Private car traffic on expressways has maintained growth, reaching 3.32 billion vehicles, an increase of 8.0% over the same period last year.

Third, freight volume has maintained a relatively rapid growth. In May, 4.65 billion tons of commercial freight volume were completed, an increase of 5.6% over the same period last year, and it continued to grow at a relatively fast rate. Positive progress has been made in the restructuring of transport structure. The growth rate of railway freight volume is about one percentage point higher than that of road freight volume. The volume of express delivery business reached 5.23 billion pieces, an increase of 25.2% over the same period last year. From January to May, the volume of business freight transportation completed was 19.99 billion tons, an increase of 6.0% over the same period of last year. The volume of express delivery business reached 22.3 billion pieces, an increase of 24.9% over the same period last year.

Fourth, port cargo throughput increased steadily. In May, the port cargo throughput reached 1.2 billion tons, an increase of 3.7% over the same period last year, of which domestic and foreign trade throughput increased by 5.2% and 0.9% respectively. The container throughput reached 22.4 million standard boxes, an increase of 3.5% over the same period last year. From January to May, the cargo throughput of the port reached 550 million tons, an increase of 4.1% over the same period last year. The container throughput reached 104.67 million standard boxes, an increase of 5.2% over the same period last year.

Fifth, the structure of urban public transport passenger transport continues to optimize. In May, passenger traffic in 36 central cities totaled 5.82 billion passengers, an increase of 3.3% over the same period last year. In terms of different modes, rail transit passenger traffic increased by 11.8%, accounting for 34.1% of urban passenger traffic, and increased by 2.6 percentage points over the same period of last year. From January to May, passenger traffic in 36 central cities completed 27.28 billion passenger trips, an increase of 3.0% over the same period last year, of which rail transit passenger traffic increased by 12.9%. In addition, our Ministry has accelerated the elimination of provincial toll stations on expressways, improved the efficiency of comprehensive transportation network, reduced logistics costs, and established hardened road-to-road buses, and achieved positive results. Next step, under the guidance of Xi Jinping's socialist ideology with Chinese characteristics in the new era, our Ministry will comprehensively implement the spirit of the Nineteenth Congress of the CPC and the Second and Third Plenary Sessions of the Nineteenth Central Committee, adhere to the general tone of steady progress, conscientiously carry out the theme education of "not forgetting the first intention, bearing in mind the mission", further inspire the spirit, take multiple measures and take precise measures. Policies and efforts should be made to ensure the full implementation of the decision-making and deployment of the Central Economic Work Association, the high-quality and efficient completion of the objectives of the Government Work Report, the smooth operation of the transport economy, the realization of high-quality development, and the contribution of transport to the stable and healthy development of the macro-economy.