China's transport construction funds still face financial stress, said He Jianzhong, spokesman of the Ministry of Transport, China news.com reported on Friday.

The fixed asset investment of national highways and waterways totaled 285.8 billion yuan during the period from January to April, 5.2 percent less than in the same period last year.

The mainland shipping market is still at a low level and the situation is not optimistic. There is a slowdown in demand and capacity while costs increase, freight rates drop and losses widen, he said.

The nationwide road passenger traffic increased by 8.6 percent year-on-year to 11.7 billion during the first four months, and the waterway passenger traffic rose 2.5 percent year-on-year to 73 million, according to the Ministry of Transport's data.

The cargo throughput completed by above-scale ports was 3.09 billion tons, realizing a year-on-year increase of 7.5 percent during the first four months. The container throughput was 54.17 million twenty-foot equivalent units, with a year-on-year increase of 8.4 percent.

He said that although development planning and implementation of China's 12th Five-Year Plan has had a good start, infrastructure construction is indeed facing some new problems and difficulties, including delayed credit funds, difficulties in implementing counterparts funds, rising construction costs, and issues with structure adjustments.