China Railway invested 325.8 billion yuan ($46.1 billion) in fixed assets in the first half of the year, overfulfilling its investment goals, People's Daily reported on Saturday.

The investment increased 1.2 percent of 3.8 billion yuan over the same period last year. Among these, 245.1 billion yuan was invested in railway infrastructure, up 3.7 percent year-on-year. As of last Wednesday, a 1,178-kilometer-long rail track had been newly opened, including 605 km of high-speed railway.

The people in charge of the construction department of China State Railway Group said due to the COVID-19 epidemic, investment in the first quarter registered a 21 percent drop from a year earlier, recording merely 79.9 billion yuan. In the second quarter, the group increased its investment plan and achieved 245.9-billion-yuan investment, up 11.4 percent year-on-year. A total of 179.7 billion yuan was thrown into infrastructure construction, up 16.4 percent on a yearly basis. Investment growth in the second quarter not only compensated the contraction in the first quarter, but also achieved total increase in railway investment.