Further southern extension of Qinghai-Tibet Railway will be beneficial to people living along China and Nepal's border, said Tanka Prasad Karki, the Nepali Ambassador to China.
"We hope the Qinghai Tibet Railway extends further towards south as earliest as possible", Ambassador Karki said in an exclusive interview with the China Daily Website, "This will bring about positive impact on the lives of people living in the border areas of both countries."
The 1,956 kilometer long Qinghai-Tibet Railway links Xining city in Qinghai province with Lhasa in Tibet. Two years after it officially opened in July, 2006, Tibet began work on a 254 kilometer extension line of the railway, which will link Lhasa and Xigaze, a city near the Nepali border, when finished in 2010.
The extension will help link southwest China and Nepal with the rest of the country, therefore giving Nepal greater access to markets in China, the Ambassador said.
Currently, there is an enormous trade deficit between Nepal and China, which Karki blamed on "poor connectivity," and the logistical difficulty of reaching China’s major markets from Nepal. Data from the Chinese Ministry of Commerce show that Nepal's exports to China in the first half of 2009 decreased by 18 percent compared to the same period last year.
Karki also said an extension of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway will allow Nepal to become a transit hub, linking Chinese exports to other parts of South Asia and India. "It is the priority of the government of Nepal to promote transit economic activities on its territory," he said.
