Thirteen years. That is the time it takes in Central Asia to build a transcontinental railway corridor spanning several thousand kilometers. In South America, that is the time it has taken to not build one.
The central bi-oceanic corridor, which is supposed to link Santos in Brazil to Ilo in Peru by crossing Bolivia, has existed on paper since 2013. It is precise, quantified, mapped. Its promoters have signed agreements, organized summits, published feasibility studies. And yet, in 2026, not a single rail has been laid on the planned route.
This delay reveals a structural pathology in South American regional governance: the inability to produce commitments that hold beyond an electoral cycle.
The Essentials
A 3,700 km railway corridor linking Brazil’s Atlantic ports to Chile and Peru’s Pacific ports was designed in 2013. In 2026, it remains at the stage of framework agreements. An agreement signed in 2025 between Brazil and Chinese state railway operator China Railway revived the matter, though it is a feasibility study concerning a route distinct from the classic Santos–Ilo railway corridor, not a construction agreement. The obstacle has never been technical or financial: political discontinuity between successive governments has systematically prevented commitments from holding. South America concentrates approximately 50–55% of the world’s identified lithium resources and represents approximately 26% of the world’s renewable freshwater resources, yet its two ocean-facing coastlines still lack a direct rail link.
The Atlantic and Pacific Separated by 3,700 km Without Railway
The idea seems obvious from the outside. South America is a continent wedged between two oceans, with natural resources among the most coveted in the world. The ABC Triangle (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile) concentrates approximately 53–54% of the world’s identified lithium resources according to the USGS, with economically exploitable reserves being dominated by Chile (36%) and Australia (24%). Brazilian soybeans feed Asia. Chilean copper is everywhere in the planet’s electronic circuits.
But to ship these resources to Asian markets from Brazil, one must either cross the Panama Canal or round Cape Horn. Both routes are long, costly, and depend on infrastructure that South America does not control. A bi-oceanic railway corridor would reduce transit to Pacific ports by several days, shortening the journey to China, Japan, and South Korea accordingly.
The central project, which follows the Santos-Santa Cruz-Ilo route over approximately 3,700 km, is the most advanced in terms of studies. It crosses three countries with very different profiles: Brazil, a continental economy with an already dense freight railway network in its agricultural regions; Bolivia, a landlocked country that sees it as an outlet to the sea; Peru, whose Pacific ports would serve as a springboard to Asia.
In theory, each has something to gain. In practice, no one has yet succeeded in building the mechanism that would transform these converging interests into physical infrastructure.
Thirteen Years of Summits, Zero Kilometers of Rail
The origins of the corridor date back to 2013, driven notably by discussions between Evo Morales and Xi Jinping during a bilateral meeting in China, which gave decisive impetus to the project. The initiative also fits within the framework of IIRSA, which has integrated bi-oceanic corridors into its portfolio since 2000. The presidents of the countries concerned gradually reach agreement on the route and the ambition. An implicit deadline for the end of the decade begins to circulate in official documents. It should be noted that the 2022 deadline sometimes encountered in sources concerning a bi-oceanic corridor actually concerns the Capricorn/Santos–Chile road corridor, not the Santos–Ilo rail corridor: confusion between these two distinct projects is common.
In 2015, IIRSA, the Initiative for the Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South America, integrates the project into its priority portfolio. Feasibility studies are commissioned. In 2017, at a summit between China and CELAC countries, the corridor figures among the infrastructure projects that Beijing intends to support within the framework of its Belt and Road Initiative.
In 2019, Brazil under Bolsonaro withdraws from UNASUR. The regional organization, already weakened by ideological divergences between left-wing and right-wing governments, loses its main potential backer. The project makes no progress, but it does not disappear either: it enters a state of suspension.
Then the alternations follow in succession. In Bolivia, Luis Arce comes to power in 2020 and reactivates interest in the corridor. In Peru, seven presidents succeed one another between 2016 and 2024, each inheriting a file that his predecessor did not advance. In Brazil, Lula’s return in 2023 puts the project back on the diplomatic table.
It is in this context that the 2025 agreement between Brazil and China Railway takes on full meaning. The Lula government signs a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Chinese state railway operator for a feasibility study concerning a route distinct from the classic Santos–Ilo railway corridor; the new proposed route links Ilhéus or Lucas do Rio Verde to Chancay, in Peru. The agreement concerns a study, not a contract for works. But it is the first concrete advance in years on this segment, according to available sources on the project (Wikipedia, Central Bi-Oceanic Railway; lediplomate.media).
The Obstacle Was Never Financing
A superficial reading of the file attributes the delay to money. Estimates of the total cost of the corridor oscillate between 10 and 15 billion dollars, depending on which segments are included and construction assumptions. It is a considerable sum for states whose public finances are under strain. But this explanation does not withstand scrutiny.
China has financed comparable railway corridors in East Africa, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia for similar amounts. Beijing has clearly demonstrated its interest in the bi-oceanic corridor: the project fits directly within the logic of the Belt and Road Initiative, which aims to secure flows of raw materials to Pacific ports. Chinese financing has materialized in the form of study agreements and memoranda of understanding.
Multilateral financing also exists. The Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) has financed preliminary studies. The context of the global energy transition, which makes Bolivian and Chilean lithium a strategic resource, reinforces the attractiveness of the project for institutional investors. The capital access obstacles that other developing infrastructure projects encounter have not been the determining factor here.
The real discontinuity is political. Every time a government comes to power with a new ideological orientation, the agreements signed by its predecessor are called into question, renegotiated, or simply ignored. The Brazilian withdrawal from UNASUR in 2019 is the most brutal example. But one should not exaggerate it: even before 2019, under governments favorable to regional integration, concrete commitments did not result in work contracts. Political discontinuity amplifies a governance problem that already existed.
The Asian Contrast and What It Says About Institutions
In 1990, the China-Central Asia-Europe railway corridor did not exist. In 2016, the first regular trains circulated between Chengdu and Rotterdam. In 2025, several thousand trains per year use routes comparable in distance and complexity to what South America has been trying to build for thirteen years.
Central Asia is equally complex politically. The transasian corridor routes cross Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Poland: countries with very different regimes, divergent interests, and some of which experienced major crises during the construction period. The difference lies in two factors.
The first is the presence of a central actor capable of committing financial and political resources over several decades without interruption: China. Beijing has financed, built, and operated entire segments of these corridors, accepting risks that sovereign states with limited resources could not have taken individually.
The second is institutional. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization and bilateral Sino-Kazakh, Sino-Kyrgyz, and Sino-Russian agreements created binding mechanisms that survive government changes. When a Kazakh prime minister changes, the legal framework governing the railway agreement with China does not change with him.
South America has not yet produced this type of mechanism. UNASUR was a dialogue forum, not an institution of binding commitment. Mercosur deals with commerce, not infrastructure. CELAC is a forum. None of these structures has the mandate, resources, or authority to commit member states to a multidecadal project independently of political alternations.
The 2030–2035 horizon thus poses a serious question. Can the 2025 Brazil-China agreement produce a dynamic different from previous ones? The answer depends on the ability to create a legal and financial framework that holds beyond the Lula mandate, more than on the political will of the moment. Without this institutional architecture, history risks repeating itself: one more study, one more summit, and a following government starting from scratch.
The Concrete Effects of the Corridor
It is useful not to lose sight of what is at stake beyond the institutional debate.
For Bolivia, the corridor represents an outlet to the sea that the country has not had since the War of the Pacific in 1879. Bolivian lithium, estimated at 21 million tonnes of identified resources according to the USGS, cannot reach Asian markets at scale without competitive transport infrastructure. The current overland route, which passes through trucks on often precarious roads to Peruvian or Chilean ports, is slow and costly. A freight train fundamentally changes the equation.
For Brazil, the issue is the competitiveness of its agricultural and mining exports to Asia. Santos is today South America’s leading port, but its hinterland is served by congested road infrastructure. Soy producers from Mato Grosso pay a logistical “Brazil cost” that erodes their margins. Rail access to Pacific ports would reduce this cost and open direct access to China, which already absorbs more than 30% of Brazilian exports.
For Peru, the ports of Ilo and Matarani would become strategic springboards for South American trade toward Asia. This is a geopolitical and commercial positioning that far exceeds the railway project alone.
The economic potential is real. Modeling commissioned by the CAF estimates that the corridor could significantly increase intra-regional trade and reduce transport costs for exports to Asia. These projections remain conditional and subject to debate, but they indicate a positive order of magnitude. The utility of the corridor is established. The issue is to produce the institutional conditions for its construction.
The 2025 Agreement Opens a Window, Not a Certainty
The agreement between Brazil and China Railway signed in 2025 deserves to be examined carefully without being overestimated. It is a memorandum of understanding (MOU) concerning a feasibility study of a route distinct from the classic CFBC Santos–Ilo corridor. The fact that Beijing commits to this at the level of a thorough study signals serious interest: China does not finance feasibility studies for projects it does not intend to support. The Bolivian and Peruvian segments nonetheless remain the most problematic, both technically and financially, notably due to the crossing of the Andes Mountains on the Peruvian side.
But between a study and a construction site, there is an abyss. The conditions China Railway will likely impose for moving to the construction phase will include guarantees of long-term concessions, tax exemptions, and a stable legal framework. Brazil has the institutional capacity to negotiate and honor this type of agreement: its infrastructure concession system, strengthened since the 2000s, offers a solid legal basis.
The most fragile link remains Bolivia. The country is experiencing a profound political and economic crisis in 2025–2026, with an open conflict between the Arce government and former president Morales that paralyzes strategic decisions. The Bolivian segment is nonetheless geographically indispensable: the Andes Mountains cannot be circumvented.
A bi-oceanic corridor financed primarily by China also raises questions about dependence on external capital in a strategic sector. Other China-financed infrastructure in Latin America has created situations of dependence that the governments concerned have subsequently struggled to renegotiate. These questions deserve to be raised before signing, not after. Development financing in Latin America remains undersized relative to needs, as evidenced by the dynamics described by the World Bank on capital flows to emerging economies.
The next observable stage is the submission of the research report commissioned to China Railway, expected in eighteen to twenty-four months. This report will say whether the two parties intend to go further, and on what terms. Until then, the corridor remains what it has been since 2013: a promise very precisely located on a map, but invisible on the ground.
The institutional challenge of the next decade is the following: will South America develop a mechanism capable of binding successive governments to multidecadal infrastructure commitments? Without this, each new summit risks being the opening act of a play one repeats without ever reaching the second act.
Sources
- Wikipedia, Central Bi-Oceanic Railway
- lediplomate.media, Brazil-China Railway Agreement 2025 (https://lediplomate.media)
- United States Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries (Lithium), 2024: https://www.usgs.gov/centers/national-minerals-information-center/lithium-statistics-and-information
- Development Bank of Latin America (CAF), Regional Infrastructure Studies, available at https://www.caf.com
- Initiative for the Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South America (IIRSA/COSIPLAN), Project Portfolio, available at https://www.iirsa.org
- USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2024 – Lithium
- USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2025 – Lithium
- Agência Brasil – Brazil-China Agreement July 2025
- Wikipedia – Bioceánico (FR)
- Paramaribo Declaration – UNASUR Summit 2013 (official Brazilian source)
- Wikipedia – Union of South American Nations
- IIRSA – Rail Integration
- Wikipedia – China-CELAC Forum
- Wikipedia – 2025 Bolivian General Elections
- Agência Brasil – Brazil-China Agreement July 2025
- Wikipedia EN – Brazil–Peru railway (origin 2013, Morales-Xi)
- ScienceDirect – Lithium in Chile (USGS reserves 2023)
- Agência Brasil – Brazilian Withdrawal from UNASUR (April 2019)
- IIRSA.org – Central Bi-Oceanic Railway Corridor Datasheet
- Planet-Terre (ENS Lyon) – Lithium Resources South America
- Wikipedia FR – Distribution of Water on Earth
- Eurasia Review – Challenges in Development of Bi-Oceanic Railway (June 2025)
- MFA China – Meeting Xi Jinping / Evo Morales, December 19, 2013
- IIRSA – Central Bi-Oceanic Railway Corridor Project Datasheet
- USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026 – Lithium
- Infobae – Evo Morales on the Interoceanic Train, December 29, 2013
- Infobea/EFE – Bolivia 2025 Review (economic crisis, Rodrigo Paz elected president)