Recently, the People's Bank of China and other departments jointly issued the "Opinions on Financial Support for Accelerating the Construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor" (hereinafter referred to as the "Opinions"), injecting new momentum into the construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor from the perspective of strengthening financial services.
Since the National Development and Reform Commission issued the "Overall Plan for the Western Land-Sea New Corridor" in August 2019, the Western Land-Sea New Corridor has been elevated to a national strategy, paving a new path for development.
A set of data reveals the impressive performance of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor. In the first three quarters of 2025, the import and export volume of western regions via the Western Land-Sea New Corridor reached 611.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 19.3%, contributing 3.4 percentage points to the overall growth of foreign trade in western regions.
In recent years, the banking industry has followed policies and taken innovation as its driving force, fully integrating into the construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor from infrastructure development to industrial empowerment, from cross-border services to risk prevention and control, providing solid support for promoting the formation of a new pattern of opening up to the outside world that is "linked between land and sea, and mutually beneficial between east and west".
From the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China's Qinzhou branch providing credit support to the Zhonggu Qinzhou Container Multimodal Transport Logistics Base, to Chongqing Rural Commercial Bank granting credit to the Guoyuan Port Container Yard Expansion Project, the precise allocation of banking credit funds is turning transportation arteries and logistics nodes from blueprints into reality.
It is worth noting that the "Opinions" emphasizes promoting the effective use of the two core financial functions of "financing" and "settlement" to support the high-quality development of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor.
As can be seen, the dual-engine drive of "financing" and "settlement" will activate the industrial chain, create a financial ecosystem with internal and external circulation, and truly upgrade geographical channels into "golden channels" for global resource allocation.
Financing is no longer simply about "giving money"; only by breaking away from the "blood transfusion" model can endogenous growth be cultivated. This means that banking services need to revolve around the industrial clusters derived from the Western Land-Sea New Corridor, penetrating the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain to achieve full integration with the real economy. Settlement, on the other hand, directly addresses the pain point of capital efficiency in cross-border trade by deeply integrating my country's payment and settlement system into the ASEAN and even broader trade network, thereby improving settlement efficiency and effectiveness.
To accelerate the construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor, the banking industry needs to deeply grasp the development needs of "major corridors, major logistics, major industries, major platforms, and major markets," and promote financial services to shift from supporting single projects to empowering the entire industrial chain, thereby helping to form an integrated development model of "corridor + industry."
In the area of industrial park construction, bank credit funds continue to flow into platforms such as free trade zones and comprehensive bonded zones to support enterprises in factory construction and equipment procurement, promoting the clustered development of port-related industries. Regarding the cultivation of distinctive industries, innovative supply chain finance products are being developed to meet the export demands of western agricultural and industrial products, alleviating the cash flow pressure on small and medium-sized trading enterprises. By forming a virtuous cycle of "the corridor carrying industry, industry driving trade, and finance supporting development," the economic radiation effect of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor continues to be released.
To accelerate the construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor, the banking industry needs to further innovate cross-border financial services. The "Opinions" clearly put forward requirements such as "facilitating cross-border trade settlement" and "supporting the facilitation of cross-border settlement of RMB and foreign currencies in new trade formats." The banking industry should remove obstacles to cross-border capital flows by connecting with international digital platforms, optimizing settlement processes, and innovating cross-border financial products.
On the one hand, we will further promote the use of RMB in cross-border trade and investment to reduce exchange rate risks for enterprises; on the other hand, we will actively introduce international financial institutions and service standards, and provide enterprises with unified and convenient due diligence, credit granting and settlement services through a "one-stop" service network of domestic and foreign branches.
To accelerate the construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor, the banking industry needs to always adhere to the bottom line of risk control and build a multi-level, cross-regional risk prevention and control system. This can be achieved by strengthening regulatory coordination, establishing a cross-regional risk early warning and disposal mechanism, and realizing "coordinated operations"; by relying on financial technology to monitor cross-border capital flows and abnormal transactions in real time, improving the efficiency of risk identification and disposal; and by respecting the rules of all parties in cross-border cooperation, seeking consensus on risk management, and ensuring the steady and long-term development of financial opening-up.
As the various measures outlined in the "Opinions" are implemented and take effect, financial resources will be more precisely channeled to all aspects of the construction of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor. With the continued support of the banking industry, the Western Land-Sea New Corridor will become a "golden channel" for integrating global resources and allocating global assets.
