[Sinopec signs Kazakhstan polyethylene project]During the state visit of President Tokayev of Kazakhstan to China, Sinopec and Kazakhstan National Oil and Gas Company signed an agreement on the key terms of the joint development of polyethylene project in the Atyrau region of Kazakhstan in Xi'an. The project is the largest natural gas chemical project in the region, and all parties are expected to make a final investment decision in 2024. Sinopec and Kazakhstan have cooperated for many years. The signing of this agreement will bring the cooperative relationship between the two parties to a new level. The combination of Sinopec's capabilities in engineering, marketing, production and operation, and Kazakhstan's strong local capabilities and resource advantages can promote cooperation and complementarity between the two parties and seek win-win development. Edit/Ma Xue
On April 3, 2026, the domestically developed maximum diameter 13.2-meter hard rock TBM by CCCC Tianhe started construction in Changshu. The machine is equipped with 7600 domestically produced rare earth special steel main bearings developed by the Institute of Metals, Chinese Academy of Sciences, with a rated life of over 15000 hours and performance exceeding imports. This move marks China Communications Construction Corporation's first achievement of 100% localization of core components for ultra large diameter tunneling machines, completely bridging the last mile of national production of major underground engineering equipment in China.Editor/Cheng Liting
At the Export to China SCO Choice Forum, Kazakh companies signed a $125 million agricultural export agreement with Chinese partners. Changsha Kaliev, the Minister of Trade of Kazakhstan, led a delegation to visit Shandong to deepen industrial and logistics cooperation. As the largest trading partner, the bilateral trade volume between China and Kazakhstan is expected to increase from 41 billion US dollars in 2023 to 48.7 billion US dollars in 2025, with Shandong's trade volume reaching 2.2 billion US dollars. Both sides are shifting from scale expansion to quality and efficiency improvement, with a focus on promoting the export of high value-added, non resource, and green technology products to ensure supply chain stability.Editor/Cheng Liting