2019 was the year in which Chinese companies finally made their way into Colombia, the Latin American country that had perhaps been most sceptical about investment from the region's second largest trading partner. Two weeks ago, headlines were full of the purchase of the gold mining company Continental Gold by the Chinese Zijin Mining Group, in truth, it Colombia opened the door to Chinese capital and its companies through the transport and infrastructure sector.

Four business deals stand out: the contract to build the long-awaited Bogota metro; the entry of electric bus fleets into Medellín and Cali; the award of the Mar 2 highway; and the bid for the suburban train in the Bogotá metropolitan area.

This marks a notable turnaround in the relationship between the two countries, despite the fact that Colombia remains one of the few countries in the region not to join China’s flagship Belt and Road Initiative. China’s ambassador in Bogotá, Xu Wei, acknowledged in October that “so far, due to the lack of knowledge and trust, we do not have a very good economic and commercial relationship”.

Bogotá metro signals transport infrastructure advance

In October, Bogotá chose two Chinese companies as winners of the tender for the construction of the first line of its metro, which will begin in 2020.

This decision – the contract for which was signed on 27 November – should put an end to a saga that has lasted more than half a century. Bogotá has seen successive plans to build the metro presented and then fall apart. People spoke of it more as a myth than of something feasible. While cities the same size as Bogotá, such as Lima, built their metros, Colombia's capital, which has 7 million inhabitants, remained one of the world's largest metropolises without a metro system.

The company is made up of APCA Transmimetro, a consortium which is 85% owned by China Harbour Engineering Company Limited (CHEC), which is a subsidiary of the state-run giant China Construction Communications Company (CCCC) and ranked 110th in Fortune magazine's top 500 global companies. Xi'an Metro Company Limited, a company from Shaanxi province that operates mainly in China and was in charge of the construction and operation of the Xi’an subway, holds 15%.

In the end, competing with a single rival and submitting the lowest bid of 13.8 billion pesos (US$4.5 billion), the Chinese consortium was awarded the Bogota subway contract, despite having little experience building metros, having faced a number of scandals surrounding some of its projects in countries such as Costa Rica, Panama, Sri Lanka and China itself.

Its mission will be to build the first line of this elevated subway, comprising 23.96km of viaduct and 16 stations, crossing the Colombian capital from south to north. The Bogotá Mayor's Office estimates that it will be able to transport 72,000 passengers per hour, helping to reduce pressure on the Transmilenio bus rapid transit (BRT in English) system. Although the characteristic red buses now account for 50% of Bogota's transport, they can no longer support demand.