23 November, 2017, Bruges, the European Shippers’ Council, with the support of the Global Shippers’ Alliance and together with the College of Europe are organising the conference“The Belt and Road Initiative: EU-China Logistics and Supply Chain”. The registration for the event opens soon.
This event seeks to bring together a wide range of scholars, experts, entrepreneurs, businessmen, practitioners, and policymakers in order to shed light on the challenges and opportunities that the BRI presents to both China and the EU in a European context. Special emphasis will be placed on the oft-overlooked technical and logistical issues, which are in fact a crucial ingredient to ensure the eventual success of the initiative.
The first panel of the conference will provide a broader introduction to the geopolitical and geo-economic implications of the BRI, with special emphasis on the notion and role of ‘connectivity’ and on how the BRI fits in and impacts on the current geopolitical situation in Europe and in its broader neighbourhood. Subsequently, the second and third panel will respectively focus on the development and impact of railway links, including the so-called China-Europe railway express, and on the growing network of maritime commercial lanes. Both panels will investigate the commercial and logistical challenges and opportunities of enhanced connectivity from both the Chinese and European standpoints, thereby offering a variety of valuable angles to analyse the status quo as well as future developments in EU-China trade relations.