Chinese companies are rushing to provide much-needed support, including excavators, to facilitate rescue work in Turkey after a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit the region, the most devastating since 1999.
An excavator of China's Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group Co (XCMG) is loaded onto a truck in Yalova in northwestern Turkey on January 7, 2023 before being delivered to Hatay, epicenter in the southernmost of the quake-hit Turkey. (Photo: Courtesy of XCMG)
A local power station that a Chinese company developed at the epicenter is also gearing up to maintain power supplies while dealing with the impact.
Turkey, a major player of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), has no shortage of cooperation with Chinese companies and projects, which offers the possibility of a quick response to the rescue work by mobilizing the best equipment and resources on hand.
A branch of Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group Co (XCMG), a leading Chinese construction machinery producer, immediately initiated an emergency mechanism on Tuesday, coordinating the movement of three excavators to the quake-hit Turkish city of Gaziantep, the Global Times learned.
The company also reached out to its local dealers to bring more excavators to the region, XCMG told the Global Times on Wednesday.
The death toll from Monday's quakes in Turkey has risen to more than 7,100 and 40,910 people have been injured, according to Turkey's Disaster Management Authority on Wednesday. Untold numbers of people are still buried in the debris, and Turkey is calling for urgent rescue operations.
The company said that more than a dozen excavators of various sizes and other heavy equipment will join the rescue work.
Aid supplies have been mobilized, with the first batch valued at more than 50,000 Turkish lira ($2,655) purchased and delivered five hours after the quake on Tuesday, XCMG said. This batch includes blankets, baby products and hygiene products, and more aid is on the way.
SANY Group, another major Chinese producer of heavy machinery, told the Global Times on Wednesday that it has excavators in Turkey, which will be coordinated as part of the company's contribution to the rescue work.
"We will participate in the rescue as part of our corporate social responsibility," an employee of the company said. The earthquake has had only a limited impact on the company's global businesses.
Turkey also has one of the largest BRI projects in the region - the Hunutlu Thermal Power Plant, a landmark project, which is located near the epicenter of the earthquake in Adana.
Thanks to the reliable quality of Made-in- China equipment, the project was undamaged during the quake. It has remained operational, providing electricity at a time of need, the Global Times learned from China Energy Engineering Corp (Energy China), the designer of the power station.
The power plant continues to generate electricity, which offers a guarantee to the aid work, even as two nearby power plants were knocked offline by the quake and reduced power supply in the region, Energy China said.
The direct impact of the disaster is limited so far for Chinese companies and projects in the region.
Employees at a branch company of PowerChina in Istanbul, which is far away from the epicenter, said that work is proceeding as normal.
XCMG told the Global Times that the supply of materials in Ankara, where a branch company is located, is adequate at the moment, but logistics have been disrupted by the quake.
China has been beefing up support for the rescue work in Turkey and neighboring regions. During a regular press conference on Wednesday, the spokesperson for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs Mao Ning said that after more than 10 hours of flying, 82 members of the Chinese rescue team arrived at the airport in the southern Turkish city of Adana in the early hours of Wednesday, with over 20 tons of aid supplies.