German freight forwarder, InstaFreight, is offering road freight services with similar transit times to air cargo between China and Europe.

In a statement, InstaFreight said its new truck service is supplementing air and rail services to help decongest and move goods out of China.

InstaFreight said that the duration of transport duration of transports amounts to 20-22 days, depending on the pickup and unloading location.

With a surcharge, double driver-lineups can also be booked, which can once more shorten the duration by several days.

“With the expansion of our service offering we stabilise the supply chain in a phase of resumed Chinese industrial production and offer a very reasonable alternative to the — at the moment — very cost-intensive air and rail transports," said Maximilian Schaefer, InstaFreight co-founder and co-managing director.

“Due to the backlog of airfreight shipments destined for Europe at the Chinese airports, on average we have almost the same overall runtime on the road as in the air.”

InstaFreight noted that the newly-added service will uphold the supply chain and ensure that important commodities quickly make their way to Europe.

Depending on the desired origin in China, InstaFreight said the transport goes directly through Russia or also Kazakhstan and Mongolia.

The prices for door-to-door delivery are calculated individually, but only amount to a fraction of the current air freight rates, it added.

“As freight forwarder, it is our role in such times to be pragmatic and to find solutions to problems such as the current stagnant flow of goods from China to Europe,” said Philipp Ortwein, founder and managing director of InstaFreight GmbH.