The National Development and Reform Commission ("NDRC") has recently issued the General Plan for New Land and Marine Routes for Western Regions (the "Plan") which draws a blueprint for the period between 2019 and 2025 and presents an outlook for 2035.
The Plan calls for accelerating the construction of transportation corridors and logistics infrastructure, improving the efficiency of route operation and logistics, promoting the integrated development of routes and regional economy, and strengthening the opening of routes and international cooperation, and also touches upon the safeguard measures. The Plan expressly states that on the premise that efforts are stepped up to avoid and control hidden debt risks faced by local governments and systemic financial risks, local regions will be encouraged to employ the public-private-partnership (PPP) mode or other methods in compliance with laws and regulations to lure domestic and foreign capital to the construction of new land and marine routes for western regions. Also, logistics giants and other strategic partners will be attracted to invest in building and operating such routes. Moreover, financial institutions of all types will be motivated to offer stronger support and innovate their financial products and financing models to financially support the routes-related projects. Platforms, including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank ("AIIB"), will be given into full play to back the construction of key projects for such routes.