China wants to open a new sea route to Europe. The Asian country aims for autonomy and, therefore, wants to connect Ningbo (in eastern China) and Felixstowe (United Kingdom).
The objective is to reduce travel time to 18 days, well below the 40 days it takes to travel through the Suez Canal or the 50 days it takes to cross the Cape of Good Hope.
With this perspective, a Chinese container ship opened the Polar Silk Road and arrived in Gdansk (Poland) two weeks ago. It started precisely from Ningbo and is a first step towards creating a third connection between the second largest economy in the world and the European continent.
The opening of this route will require a commercial partnership with Russia, as the project will be supported on the Northern Sea Route (which passes close to the North Pole), according to Chinese state television CCTV. At stake is a commercial route that connects the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic.
Another highly important factor is Moscow’s project to invest the equivalent of 22 billion dollars by 2035 in carrying out frequent crossings of icebreakers. The objective is to make this a more viable route in the future.