Russia to develop far eastern railway network

Russia's state railway firm Joint Stock Company (JSC) Russian Railways planned to invest 562 billion rubles (17.8 billion U.S. dollars) to develop the Far Eastern railway network over the next five years, RIA Novosti news agency reported. The project will increase the annual carrying capacity of Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM) and Trans-Siberian Railway by 25 million tons of cargo, up from 16.2 million tons in 2011. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said earlier this week that the government was ready to provide the company with 260 billion rubles (8.2 billion dollars) to upgrade the two railways by 2017, in a bid to promote the socio-economic development in Siberia and the Far East region. The Russian government has committed to infrastructure construction in the once isolated area in recent years to increase exports to Asian countries, which is crucial to the country's economy in the future. The 9,289-km Trans-Siberian line connects the capital city of Moscow to the Pacific port of Vladivostok. The 4,324-km BAM crosses Siberia and Far East several hundred kilometers north of the Trans-Siberian line.