Sitting in a Phnom Penh teashop under the fan, checking the news—goods loaded at a port on China's Beibu Gulf and shipped straight down to Sihanoukville now take just five days. That cuts the travel time by more than half compared to the old route via Guangdong, giving shipping bosses a brand-new express lane.
Local media reports say this is all thanks to the newly opened Pinglu Canal, which links China's inland southwest directly to the Beibu Gulf. Over in Qinzhou, they are running combined river-sea transport, and the ports are kitted out with AI and automated gear. Loading and unloading is 20 to 30 percent faster than before, while port turnaround times and operating costs have both dropped.
For people here in import-export, this new route is a massive time-saver. Whether it is industrial materials or local agricultural goods like rice, bananas, and mangoes, as long as schedules stay regular and freight rates make sense, businesses will have another handy way to get local produce into the Chinese market much faster.
