On 12 October 2026, a China-Europe freight train carrying auto parts and electronics left Alashankou in Xinjiang for Małaszewicze in Poland. China News Service, carrying a Xinjiang Daily report, says this train took this year's count of China-Europe (Central Asia) trains supervised by Alashankou Customs past 7,000. That is 45 days earlier than last year and the highest total of any port in China. In earlier years the port usually reached 7,000 trains only in late November.
The report credits the faster pace mainly to the 'smart rail port + local fast clearance' reform. Manifests are sent before the goods arrive, so customs can review documents and assess risk in advance. The reform removed transit declarations, second declarations and port write-off steps. Companies now declare once at their inland location, and the goods are released for the whole journey. Customs and railway data are synchronised in real time.
A local forwarder, Alashankou Bobao International Freight, says clearance that used to take two to three days now takes as little as 16 hours, and operating costs have fallen by 30%. Overall clearance time for imports has been cut by more than 70%. Alashankou Customs says inspection efficiency per train is up 70%, and a joint 'port + unloading site' model has halved overall clearance time. Non-intrusive scanning means a boarding inspection can take as little as 10 minutes. Guandian, citing Alashankou Customs, reports a single-day peak of 36 trains.
Alashankou now handles 130 China-Europe (Central Asia) train routes reaching 21 countries, including Germany and Poland, and carries more than 200 types of goods. For buyers sourcing from inland China, this is a busy, high-frequency rail gateway to the EU and Central Asia, with clearance times that are getting shorter and easier to predict.