Work on more than 25km of road tunnel, part of a $770m 147km highway improvement in Yunnan Province in south west China, has got the green light following approval of a $250m Asian Development Bank (ADB) loan.
The project is being organised by Beijing based CMC International Tendering Co., which is responsible for construction tenders and the supply of equipment. CMC is working on behalf of the toll road concessionaire, the Yuanjiang-Mohei Expressway Company based in Kunming, the capital of Yunnan Province.
The 147km two-lane dual carriageway scheme has been split into 18 packages, three of which are purely tunnelling projects, although there are small sections of tunnels in some of the other contracts.
The largest tunnel is the 8.1km long Bulongqing link. The second largest is the 5.3km long Dafengyakou Tunnel, followed by the 5.1km Yuanjiang Tunnel.
Yunnan is one of China’s poorest regions, and the tunnels and highway improvements are part of a wider Greater Mekong project to improve road communications between Kunming and Chiang Rai in Thailand.
Work is set to start by early next year, with completion by September 2003.The ADB loan meets 32.5 % of the total cost. The remainder is coming from Chinese sources, which include the Yunnan provincial government.
