Global Supply Chain: The Circus-Hong Kong Campaign Launches China's Port Battle to Upgrade

The prediction that "Hong Kong has no place to secure the world's largest container port" appeared long ago as early as a few years ago, but recently, this prediction began to come true.

In March 2005, Hong Kong port throughput was 1.799 million TEUs, down 7.2% year-on-year. The first quarter throughput was also lower than people's previous expectations, at 5.28 million TEUs. Hong Kong’s long-time rival, the Singapore Port, enjoyed a good start with the advantage of 30,000 TEUs, temporarily replacing Hong Kong with the world’s port container throughput leader.

Although 2005 was still far from the time of the Ming Dynasty's withdrawal, the biggest drop in throughput since the September 11 incident has caused Hong Kong to become somewhat restless. Industry insiders attributed the drop in Hong Kong's port throughput to the use of several new berths in Shenzhen.

An executive from Taiwan's Evergreen told reporters that according to the current pace of development, Shenzhen is expected to surpass Hong Kong in 2-3 years. Coupled with the high cost of Hong Kong's ports, which is almost twice that of Shenzhen, many companies have transferred their containers to Shenzhen Chiwan, and the direct flights to Chiwan have gradually increased in the past two years.

The infighting between Shenzhen and Hong Kong did not occur until 2005, and a more vigorous Chinese port war has actually been escalated.

Grab the hub

According to calculations by the head of the Research Group for Sustainable Development Research of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and chief scientist Niu Wenyuan, the three major urban agglomerations of the Pearl River Delta, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Bohai Sea currently account for 10% and 18% of the national GDP respectively. 5%, by 2020, this group will increase to 20%, 30% and 15% respectively. With the development of economy and trade, the volume of domestic and foreign trade water transportation in these several urban agglomerations has been continuously enlarged, and it is naturally the focus of port cities to compete with who they match.

In the Pearl River Delta, Shenzhen Port’s action was only the first step.

In April, as the Mawan No.5 berth passed the acceptance check and was formally put into operation, a special container berth was added to Shenzhen West Port. The annual design throughput of the newly commissioned deep-water berths is 450,000 TEUs. This figure is not too large, because the investor China Merchants International’s appetite at Shenzhen Port is far from being filled. As one of the major companies under the China Merchants International Group, Shekou Container Terminal Co., Ltd. has been occupying an important position in Shenzhen’s Western Port area. According to the company’s public affairs manager Lin Yiping, “The berth No. 6 is about to be put into production in July this year. 7 The berth will be completed in early 2006."

In the eastern port area of ​​Shenzhen, the four berths of the Yantian International Phase 3 project occupying the top of the "Top 10 China's Ports" have been completed and put into production. In mid-April, the reporter saw at the observation deck on the top floor of the Yantian International Office Building that through the digging of mountains and land reclamation, an embryonic form of a 300,000-square-meter yard has appeared. If it is successful, the total investment of 6.6 billion Hong Kong dollars will be completed by the end of this year.

In the past, in the Pearl River Delta port group, Guangzhou Port has always given people a stable and low-key impression. However, with the formal launch of the first phase of Nansha Port District on September 28, 2004, Guangzhou Port has also changed its low profile in the past, and it has begun to show the industry's admiration. According to the port expert's analysis, Nansha Port, as the geographic geometric center of the Pearl River Delta, faces Shenzhen Chiwan across the sea, and is backed by manufacturing bases such as Nanhai, Panyu, Shunde, etc. It has become the Guangzhou-Foshan economic circle and the west of the Pearl River Delta. The only way to the ocean.

“Nansha Port Area is the port with the smallest weighted average economic distance from the source area of ​​the South China Sea. The logistics cost is the lowest!” Zhang Zhenzhong, Deputy Minister of Manufacturing Business of Guangzhou Port Group Co., Ltd. expressed his confidence with two “most” words. . He explained that there are 70 km of land transport from Guangzhou to Nansha Port, 85 km from Nanhai to Nansha Port, and about 60 km from Panyu, Shunde, Zhongshan, and Dongguan to Nansha Port. "With the implementation of the Guangzhou Nantuo Strategy and the establishment of the 'Pan-Pearl River Delta' economic framework agreement, it will provide a wide supply of support for the Nansha Port area. Although the throughput of the three months last year was only 130,000 TEU, this year Our Nansha will strive to break 1 million TEUs."

It is reported that the second phase of the Guangzhou Port Nansha Port area was also approved by the National Development and Reform Commission in February of this year. Six 50,000-ton multi-purpose berths will be constructed this year. According to industry analysts, the construction of the second phase of the project will result in a qualitative change in the pattern of the Guangzhou port area, forming a new pattern of the Guangzhou port area with the Nansha port area as the leader and the Xinsha and the Huangpu ports as auxiliary forces, and building a modern international strong port for Guangzhou. has great significance.

Although there is no dense distribution of ports in the Pearl River Delta, container throughput of the Yangtze River Delta port group has occupied half of the country's domestic container throughput. At the end of March this year, the "Outline of the Modern Highway Water Transport Plan for the Yangtze River Delta Region" was issued with a clear focus on implementation: Prior to 2010, a throughput of 47 million TEUs had been formed in the "Yangtze River Delta" region. If we compare the predicted throughput of 100 million TEUs with container throughput in China's mainland ports in 2010, it means that the “Yangtze River Delta” region with the above seaport as the center will bear the throughput of nearly 50% of domestic containers.

Although the "Outline" once again reiterated that the Yangtze River Delta region will be the center of the above seaport, with Ningbo Port and Suzhou Port and the Yangtze River Link Port below the Nanjing Port as two wings, together forming a container transport system built by the Shanghai International Shipping Center, but Ningbo Port has been working Fighting for an equal opportunity with Shanghai, this can be seen from a series of recent moves in Ningbo Port.

After enjoying the sweetness of last year’s promotional activities, during the “Hong Kong Zhejiang Week” in January of this year, Ningbo Port Group and Yimail (China) Co., Ltd. signed a contract for Ningbo Port’s Beilun Phase IV with a total investment of US$250 million. Wharf Project Agreement; also signed the "Ningbo Container Terminal Phase II Reconstruction Joint Venture Project" with Hong Kong Hutchison Whampoa Port Group Co., Ltd.; in addition, Ningbo has also established a berth with Beifang Port to build a berth for the Phase IV container terminal of Beilun Port. And the four berths of Phase Five Container Terminals, the total investment of the project is 650 million U.S. dollars.

In addition to its cooperation with Hong Kong, Ningbo Port has also actively contributed to Taiwan Changrong’s investment in Beilun IV. It is hoped that by cooperating with shipping companies to build terminals, it will attract large shipping companies to call ports and increase port throughput. The Ningbo Daxie Development Zone China Merchants International Container Terminal Project has also been approved by the National Development and Reform Commission recently. The construction scale is three 100,000-ton and one-70,000-ton container berths and corresponding supporting facilities. The designed annual handling capacity is 240 Million standard boxes. According to industry analysis, the project will add a powerful bargaining chip to the competition between Ningbo Port and Shanghai Port.

The development goals of Ningbo’s ports have been very clear: By 2007, Ningbo Port will basically build a world-class deep-water hub port and an international container-going ocean trunk port, build a deep-water port in Shanghai’s international shipping center, and build containers, ore, crude oil, and coal. Liquid chemical five major transit bases and port logistics information platform; Hong Kong cargo throughput reached 250 million tons, and strive to enter the world's top five ports; the total container throughput reached 7 million TEUs or more, and strive to enter the world's top 15 ports , the top four domestic ports.

In the face of Ningbo’s aggressive situation, Shanghai pledged its treasure to the Yangshan Deepwater Port, which will be put into operation in October this year. Although its first-phase engineering design capacity is only 2.2 million TEUs, in the eyes of Shi Hongjing, manager of the Planning Department of the Shanghai International Port Group Investment Development Department, Yangshan Port is a “giant” with a 25 million TEUs appetite. “At present, we are negotiating with the shipping company to adjust the ports of call of the US West Coast and the Mediterranean Sea to prepare for the trial production of the first phase.” Stone Path said.

Different from the Pearl River Delta and Yangtze River Delta port groups, the rims around the Bohai Sea have been steered by Qingdao, Tianjin and Dalian. Luo Ping of the National Development and Reform Commission’s Institute of Comprehensive Transport said in an interview with reporters: “The ports of the Pearl River Delta and the Yangtze River Delta are vertically distributed, while the ports of the Bohai Rim are horizontally distributed, and the hinterland is relatively independent, with each demand.”

Even so, the competitive landscape of the three ports in the north has not really been silenced after it has written "Dalian into an important international shipping center in Northeast Asia" in the Central Document No. 11. Professor Wang Nuo, Dean of the School of Transportation and Logistics Engineering at Dalian Maritime University, said that the central government's position on Dalian should not become a slander for the development of other ports in the Bohai Rim. "This formulation is not exclusive, and we should see the division of labor in different ports."

Recently, Tianjin Port began to use the logistics of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games to propose a 55% expansion plan for Tianjin Port. This plan immediately attracted the interest of international shipping giant Maersk. It is reported that Maersk’s investment will account for 30% of the entire expansion project. As a result, port battles in the Bohai Sea will once again begin.

In any case, it can be expected that, with their respective developments, the three hub ports in the Bohai Rim will change their position in the Northeast Asian regional port rankings. “Qingdao Port will be ranked first, and may enter the top 3 ports in Northeast Asia, Tianjin Port will also enter the top 5, Dalian will be upgraded from the current 8th to 5th within 5 years, and is currently in stagnation. Busan, Yokohama, Osaka and even Tokyo Port may all be squeezed out of the top 5." Wang Nuo predicted boldly.

Matthew effect

Judging from the expansion of domestic major ports, it will form a hub port structure in the Pearl River Delta with Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hong Kong, the Yangtze River Delta with Shanghai and Ningbo, and the Bohai Rim region with Qingdao, Tianjin and Dalian as the main components. However, the formation of these hub ports cannot be separated from the support and cooperation of their surrounding ports.

According to Fei Weijun, assistant director of the Institute of Waterway Transport Scientific Research of the Ministry of Transport, from the perspective of the formation of an international shipping center, the status of a container hub is unique within a certain region. Once the position of the hub is established, it can be supported. The advantages of its airline flights form an accumulation effect and a scale effect, and the rest of the East Asian hub ports are shot and sent to port and branch ports. This is the so-called “Matthew effect”.

For small and medium-sized ports, “If you do not position and develop in accordance with the level of the feeder port and feed port, you will have unimaginable consequences,” said Professor Zong Xiaohua from Shanghai Maritime University’s School of Transportation Management. According to her introduction, many ports in Japan such as Tokyo, Yokohama, Osaka, and Nagoya were too intensive to compete for prices in order to seize the goods, which eventually led to the collective decline of port competitiveness.

Compared with other ports in the country, the attitude of Tianjin Port seems to be overwhelming, and its coordinated development with the surrounding ports is also a model in the industry.

The aim is to target Tianjin Port, an international container hub in Northeast Asia, and it has been equally important to see the development of Bohai Rim container transport. According to the person in charge of the Tianjin Port Authority, in recent years, the Tianjin Port has always taken the Bohai Rim Internal Line as a key development and key support route. Last year, the total throughput of the Tianjin-Tonghai Inner Mongolia branch reached 23,000 TEUs.

The person in charge of the port authority said that after many years of cultivation, the Huanhai Inland Branch has developed into two operating routes, covering Yingkou, Qinhuangdao, Dalian, Jingtang, Yantai and other ports in the Bohai Rim. The shippers provide convenient branch transportation services. Although all the domestic branch line transportations in operation are domestic liner companies, the operating vessels are also mainly small vessels, and the volume of transportation accounts for a relatively small proportion of the total port containers, but they occupy an important position in the overall route layout.

Recently, in order to further maintain the internal branch operations, Tianjin Port negotiated with Tianjin Customs to jointly research and formulate the “Operation Plan for Internal and Foreign Freight Containers Shipped on the Same Branch of Ships with Internal Branches” so that the Central Branch of Bohai Bay was the first to successfully implement domestic and foreign trade containers in the national ports. The same ship transportation has greatly improved the shipping efficiency of the ship. According to some media reports, Tianjin Port and Qinhuangdao Port have been successfully operating. This year, they will gradually be implemented with other Bohai Rim ports such as Yantai and Yingkou, in order to further expand the intra-branch traffic volume and expand the coverage of the intra-trailer network in Tianjin Port.

However, looking at the distribution of the ports in the Bohai Bay, we can see that the hinterland of Tianjin and Dalian has some overlap. As a result, the development of the internal branch of Tianjin Port may also touch the interests of Dalian Port. In the view of Dalian Port, the neighboring Jinzhou, Yingkou and Dandong municipalities are sure to become Dalian's feeding port. However, this conflict is not as serious as it was now. According to the person in charge of ship dispatching of the internal branch line of Dalian China Shipping Container Lines, there is indeed a part of the container because Dalian did not open a direct route and must be shipped to Tianjin Port by barge and then loaded on the ship. However, the person responded very calmly to this: “This is very Normal behavior in line with market laws."

However, not all ports have the same mentality as Tianjin, and Yingkou Port, which is close to Dalian and Tianjin, has recently been actively changing its focus.

In the “Eleventh Five-Year Plan” of Yingkou Port, it is clearly stated that in 2008, container throughput should reach 1.8 million to 2 million TEUs, and in 2010, the container throughput should reach 2.6 million to 3 million TEUs. This is almost equivalent to The goal of Dalian Port is up and down. Professor Zonghua Hua believes that the positioning of the port should be comprehensively determined based on various factors such as the location of the port, the economy and processing capacity of the hinterland, and it must be consistent with the market laws. However, when reporters visited Yingkou Port Group in mid-March, Pan Weisheng, general manager of Yingkou Port, made it clear: “We will actively support and cooperate with the construction of an important international shipping center in Northeast Asia.”

In the Yangtze River Basin port line with Shanghai as the lead, there is another kind of relationship between the hub port and the feeder port.

On the morning of April 19th, Li Minkuan, as usual, drove a barge from Ma’anshan Port in Anhui Province to Shanghai and docked at a container terminal under the Yangpu Bridge in Huangpu River. After queuing for about 2 hours, his barge was on The more than 10 containers were finally hoisted on a large vessel of 3000 TEU in China Shipping Group. Around 3 pm, his ship was again carrying a corresponding number of empty containers to drive back to Maanshan. On the banks of the Yangtze River, there are many people who repeat the rhythm of life like Li Min Kuan. According to Ms. Li from the CSCL Marketing Department, China Shipping Group will receive daily containers from Shanghai, Nantong, Nanjing, Zhangjiagang, Wuhan, Jiujiang, Nanchang and other Yangtze River basins to Shanghai. These containers may be unloaded in the Huangpu River. More is the transfer to Waigaoqiao Port. This phenomenon clearly shows that the above ports in the Yangtze River Basin have already played the role of feeding ports in Shanghai.

In the more competitive Pearl River Delta port community, there is some preconceived taste for the competition for feeding ports and feeder ports.

“The South China Barge Express has a great influence on us.” Zhang Zhenzhong, of the Hong Kong Group’s manufacturing business, has a few words. The so-called South China Express Barge Line is actually an operation mode launched by Shenzhen Chiwan (CCT) and Shekou (SCT) terminals to expand the hinterland. According to Lin Yiping, Shekou Container Terminal Co., Ltd., in 2001, the two terminals jointly cooperated with several powerful barge companies to open up the express line. "At present, the network has covered Guangxi, Fangcheng, Beihai, Foshan, Huangpu, Jiangmen, Maoming, Nanhai, Panyu, Shunde, Zhuhai, Zhanjiang, Zhongshan, Zhaoqing and even Haikou and other Pan-Pearl River Delta regions."

What can't be understood by Zhang Zhenzhong is that the above areas are closer to Guangzhou Nansha Port. They should have been the port of feeding in Guangzhou Port. But now they can only watch the goods being delivered to Shenzhen Port. In an interview, the reporter found that these feed ports have tried every means to prevent local shippers from directly dragging containers through trailers to the Nansha Port area for the sake of their own local interests, especially ensuring the throughput of local ports. "Because the trailers can be shipped directly to Nansha Port, then we have no goods to leave in Hong Kong," said a person in charge of a freight forwarding company in Foshan.

"It is very difficult for these containers to return to Guangzhou Port at one time," Zhang Zhenzhong concluded after several attempts. This conclusion will also mean that if the port of Guangzhou cannot develop new routes as soon as possible to attract sources of supply, one day the port of Guangzhou will have to become a feeding port for Shenzhen Port.

With regard to the topic of the Port of Hong Kong, initially pilot plots were set up in the Yangtze River Delta port group. However, unfortunately, the port of combination eventually survived. However, in the recent past, a message that comforted the Chinese port community was the smooth combination of Xiamen Port and Zhangzhou Port in February this year. It will make its debut with the new port group of Xiamen Bay. Chen Shui-bian, deputy director of the Xiamen Port Authority, highly praised the move: "This is very necessary to promote the development of Xiamen Port into a regional hub port."

Chen Shui-bian's words conveyed a signal that the ports really need to move from competition to cooperation. Only in this way can a win-win situation be truly realized.

The new theme of preparation for Hong Kong Airlines

Around the new round of competition and cooperation in the port, the port companies also started preparations for infrastructure.

“The large scale of the ship will be a trend in the world's shipping development!” Ms. Lan Lan, chief representative of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in the United States, is convinced. In 1988, the world’s first super-Panamax container ship (4,240 TEUs) was launched. In less than 10 years, 6th-generation container ships of 5th and 8736 TEUs with more than 4800 TEUs were launched. As early as many years ago, experts predicted that between 2000 and 2005, the 5th-generation container ships with more than 5,000 TEUs and a draught of more than 14 meters will become mainstream ships. In the world's three major east-west vessels operating on the trunk line, the proportion of super-Panamax container ships will reach 55-65% in 2010 and 65-70% in 2020.

As a result, the topic of large-scale ship development followed. The shipping companies are keen to build large ships. Foreign giants are represented by Maersk-sea and land, Mediterranean shipping, and France's CMA. Domestic COSCO and China Shipping are not to be outdone. According to sources from Caffei Ferry Shanghai Co., Ltd. who are in charge of the operation of China-Europe route, Cleveland will launch 8 giant wheels of 9200 TEUs worldwide this year to replace the 6,500 TEUs currently operating in Europe. China’s China Shipping Group is the first company to go forward. Since 2004, it has successively launched four 8,000 TEUs of vessels, including China Shipping Asia; and COSCO Group’s shipbuilding ambitions are not weak. In 2004, China’s China Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. set up five 8500 TEUs in a single round. It will be launched simultaneously when Yangshan Port is put into production.

Along with the boat company's big boat movement, various ports have opened deepwater ports. Yangshan Port is a typical example. As a symbol of the Shanghai International Shipping Center's framework, the first phase of the Yangshan Port project has 1600 meters of quayside shoreline and 5 container berths. It can dock fifth and sixth generation container ships, taking into account the berthing of 8,000 standard containers of container ships. Waterway dredging project has also become a common topic for many domestic ports. Among them, the above ports, Xiamen Port, and Guangzhou Port are the most urgent ones. In a recent interview, the reporter learned that Xiamen Port has been striving to expand the fairway in order to welcome the arrival of the giant wheel era; both Guangzhou Nansha Port and Shenzhen Chiwan Port have actively promoted the dredging of the Tonggu Channel in order to avoid too much reliance on the bypass of Hong Kong.

However, for the big boat sport, not every port and shipping company has followed suit. In the main ports of the western United States, due to the existence of strike risks and the phenomenon of pressure on the port, people have begun to worry about whether there is a tipping point in the ratio of ship handling efficiency to risk. As a representative of the shipping company, an executive from Shenzhen representative office of Evergreen Hong Kong Limited told the reporter: “Evergreen did not build a giant ship because the safety risk of the giant ship will also make it difficult to anchor the ship. The overall economy is not necessarily "Okay," the industry analysts said. The fact that more than 8,000 TEUs of ships would indeed bring difficulties to the port of call, and may lead to the risk of similar ships not being able to pass through the Suez Canal and having to bypass South Africa.

Only the docks are not enough for the shipping center, and the ability to collect and unload ports cannot be ignored. This has also become the focus of major port competitions.

According to a representative of the owner of the Shanghai Tongsheng Group Investment Company, for the smooth operation of Yangshan Port, the Donghai Bridge, which was built with huge investment, will also be open to traffic at the end of this year, becoming the only passage linking the port area to the land; the newly built Liangang Avenue and A2 Important infrastructure such as the expressway (Hulu Highway) will also be used in conjunction with the investment. According to reports, the most dazzling thing is that the southern section of the Pudong railway will be completed by the end of this year in parallel with the first phase of the Yangshan deep-water port project, and will assume the responsibility of meeting the needs of deep-water port construction and container transportation. However, when reporters visited Luchao Port in early April, they did not see signs of significant progress on the Pudong Railway. Later, when the reporter wanted the person in charge of the Shanghai Lingang Economic Group Investment Promotion Department to verify, the person in charge was very sensitive to avoid such topics.

In neighboring Ningbo, the section of the Ningbo-Daqiao-Shugang Port Extension, which is located at the second and third phase container terminals of the Beilun Port area of ​​Ningbo Port, was also prequalified by experts on March 9. It is reported that after the project is completed, the mileage can be shortened by 1.6 kilometers compared with the original route.

Many domestic ports have established deep-water ports and related supporting transportation systems. The target is directed at the Northeast Asia International Shipping Center. This round of competition is synchronized between China and the rest of the world.

Statistics show that there are more than 40 deep berths for containers that have been built and under construction in Northeast Asia. The most prominent ones are Busan and Gwangyang Ports in South Korea. Busan Port plans to build 33 container-specific berths by 2011, forming a throughput of 15 million TEUs. Gwangyang Port, which is less than 100 kilometers away from Busan, plans to build 33 berths with a depth of 16 to 20 meters by 2011 at a rate of 4 berths per year.

Some experts predict that in the next 5 to 10 years, Northeast Asia will have a new international shipping center. While the State Council decided to build Shanghai's international shipping strategy, neighboring countries and regions adjacent to Shanghai have stepped up their efforts to seize the shipping center in Northeast Asia. Busan, South Korea, proposed the establishment of a “21st Century Central Pacific City Center Port” target. Kaohsiung proposed building an “Asia Pacific Operations Center”. Northeast Asia's various ports are eager for China's abundant box sources. Busan and Gwangyang Port are planning to attract shipping companies with low tariffs and excellent services, feeding China’s Qingdao and Dalian Ports as feeders, and the vast Chinese mainland, including Xinjiang, as their source of hinterland.

Judging from the physical conditions and cargo throughput of the harbor and the like, China’s ports do not lag behind. According to the stone path, Shanghai Port's current designed throughput capacity is 8.5 million TEUs, but it has reached 14.55 million TEUs last year and is expected to exceed 17 million TEUs this year. Stone Path believes that "Shanghai International Airport is surely the world's number one in the future!" Especially when Yangshan Port is fully completed and put into production, Yangshan Port alone has a throughput capacity of 25 million TEUs, which has exceeded Hong Kong's current standard of 24 million. The annual throughput of the box (probably 2004 data).

However, according to international practice, the hub port requires a 40% international cargo transit rate, while China’s largest port, Shanghai Port, has only 0.7% international cargo transit rate in 2003. Not only that, but also in terms of domestic transit, Shanghai Port still needs to work hard to coordinate. For other ports, the gap is even more pronounced.

Test "Freeport"

"In addition to the goods shipped by our own company, we can also undertake third-party warehousing business." A senior person who did not want to be named by Zhonglian Fuyun Storage & Transportation (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. ("CUC") He told reporters that he is mainly responsible for the company's warehousing business in the Yantian Port Free Trade Zone.

In December 2002, Zhonglian Fuyun signed a leasing agreement with Yantian Port Group Company for 27,000 square meters of land in the South District. In June 2003, a warehouse with a building area of ​​14,000 square meters was put into operation. Its main function is to assemble and process products and do import and export business. "But we do not help the owner of the company to purchase raw materials," the source said.

Although the cost of locating warehouses in the bonded area is very high, China United Express is still happy to do so, because providing relatively complete supporting services can obtain high value-added profits from customers. “We are mainly engaged in the transportation, warehousing, processing and trade of dry goods, but tobacco and auto parts are not allowed to do it.” Yanping Wenhui Storage & Transportation Co., Ltd. and Lianyi Industrial Co., Ltd. have settled in the bonded area of ​​Yantian Port together with Zhonglian Fuyun. Shenzhen (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. and Ritong Storage & Transportation (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. and other five companies. The business between them is basically misplaced.

In fact, the reason why shippers prefer to look for logistics companies such as Zhonglian Fuyun is that because of the special policy of the bonded area, all or most of the goods entering or leaving the port area are exempt from customs duties, which can save the owner companies a large amount of money. The "regional-port-linkage" policy that the country is implementing is more tempting.

Almost all ports are looking forward to the transition to Freeport, and the policy of “zone-port linkage” is essentially a field of experimentation. The “zone-port linkage” is to add together the advantages of the bonded area and the port area to form a new functional area and promote the development of the modern logistics industry. This is mainly reflected in the location of the port and the combination of the port area and the bonded area of ​​the port area to make the flow of bonded goods more convenient and smooth.

The Bonded Zone after the district-port linkage has only taken a small step toward achieving a free trade port. A truly free trade port refers to a port area that is located outside of the territory of the country and region and customs management, and allows the free entry and exit of goods and funds from abroad. All or most of the goods entering or leaving the port area are exempted from customs duties, and free activities such as the free storage, exhibition, dismantling, refitting, repackaging, sorting, processing, and manufacturing of the goods are permitted within the Freeport. The Hong Kong and Singapore ports in Hong Kong and Singapore, which are currently ranked first and second in the world's container ports, have implemented free port policies to attract a large number of containers to transit.

Observers believe that the gradual transition of Chinese ports to free trade ports is imminent. Take Qingdao Port as an example. Originally among the ports of northern China, Qingdao Port was the most powerful port to compete with Busan, South Korea, and Yokohama, Japan. However, due to the free port policies of Japan and South Korea and other overseas ports, a large number of international containers, especially ocean-going containers, have been transferred from overseas to the north, seriously restricting the development of the ports and the construction of hub ports in Qingdao ports.

According to research data, due to the lack of an accompanying free trade policy, a large number of outbound container transshipment services in China's ports have been transferred to Japan and South Korea. The procedure is simple, fast, efficient, and costs 20% less than Shanghai Port. , 10% cheaper than Qingdao Port. According to statistics, the number of transfer containers that were lost to the port of Busan, South Korea, in 2003 alone reached more than 2 million TEUs, while the volume of containers transferred via South Korea reached more than 4 million TEUs per year. With only one transfer fee, China lost more than 400 million U.S. dollars every year.

Although as early as in the early 1990s China learned from the practice and successful experience of establishing free trade zones abroad, 15 bonded zones have been set up in coastal neighboring ports, but at that time, the free trade function of the bonded zones was not in place. With the globalization of the economy. The development of poor customs clearance and weakened advantages has become a common problem in the bonded area. As a result, China's port cities have begun a new round of reforms: the Bonded Zone and the port have been linked, transitioning to the free trade zone and transitioning to a free port.

In April 2004, China's first "zone-port linkage" pilot started in Shanghai Waigaoqiao Free Trade Zone. Shortly after August 16th, the General Office of the State Council officially approved the “Request for Expansion of the Linkage between the Bonded Zone and the Port Area” issued by the General Administration of Customs, and approved the joint operation of seven bonded areas such as the Qingdao Free Trade Zone with the neighboring harbor area. The transition from the Free Trade Zone to the International Free Trade Zone is a prelude to the “zone-port linkage”, which is conducive to strengthening Qingdao Port’s competitiveness in Northeast Asian ports.

Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, has become one of the main promoters of the transformation of Chinese ports into free trade ports. Cheng Siwei suggested that since the free trade port should be "outside the territory," it means that goods entering the free trade port are equivalent to being exported, and it will be more convenient for the goods to be re-exported at the free trade port.

Some analysts believe that the implementation of “zone-port linkage” will greatly accelerate the speed of customs clearance and reduce business costs. Qingdao Port can obtain more than 2 million boxes from the transit source in Busan. Coupled with the increasing supply from the Mainland, Qingdao Port is In 5 to 10 years, it will overtake Busan and become the largest international port in Northeast Asia. According to estimates by experts, for every RMB 1 output of port logistics, 8 yuan of output will be available for other related industries.

However, merely implementing the district-port linkage policy is not the only way to bring supply to the port, and the logistics function service status around the port is even more prominent.

Shandong Rizhao Port Logistics Company is a typical example. It is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Rizhao Port and is mainly engaged in the procurement of bulk bulk cargo. “Logistics companies are a useful complement to the development of ports, integrating upstream procurement, transportation, and rail transportation,” said Wang Jianbo, general manager of Shandong Rizhao Port Logistics. Since 2001, Rizhao Port Logistics Co., Ltd. has been relying on the advantages of the port to help some iron and steel companies purchase iron ore, and now there are more than 10 small and medium sized steel companies that purchase iron ore raw materials. "Our purchases of these iron ore are not all of the procurement of steel companies," he said. Wang Jianbo said that the company's annual turnover reached 80 to 900 million yuan, "the added value of these businesses is relatively high."

Competition for Port Investment

In the process of preparing for port infrastructure and competing for a free port, Chinese ports have also begun to bid farewell to a single investment model, and the capital of all parties has been fiercely contested.

With the integration of the global economy, China, as a “factory of the world,” has undergone major changes in the structure and quantity of its port cargo, which has directly led to the current situation of “many ships and fewer ships” in the port. As a shipping company, it also began to gradually increase the investment in port terminals. Compared to pure terminal operators, they seem to have more chances of winning.

In the middle of 2004, Taiwan Evergreen Group and the Ningbo Port Authority signed a joint venture "Intent for Investment" and squeezed Hutchison Li Ka-shing's Hutchison Whampoa to successfully obtain the operational rights of the Beilun Port Phase IV container terminal. This is the first time that a Taiwan-funded company has obtained the joint venture right of the mainland port. Earlier, Hutchison had previously released the sound of the wind, in addition to intending to invest in Beilun Port next to the second grocery terminal and coal terminal, more interested in obtaining the forthcoming Beilun Port IV project. Nowadays, there are signs that it has failed.

In the early years, with the experience of global terminal management, Hutchison became a very popular investor in domestic ports. “Hutchison has indeed made a great contribution to the management of backward port companies at that time.” Huang, Manager of Ningbo Port Group, once told this reporter. Therefore, in investing in China's port terminals, Hehuang also took the lead and the infrastructure was the most secure. It mainly operates eight domestic container ports, including Shenzhen Yantian Port, Shanghai, Beilun, Xiamen, Shantou, Jiangmen, and other ports. The first of the dock joint ventures.

The port operators such as Hutchison are the biggest players in the port investment industry, controlling 10% to 15% of the global maritime trade. However, the shipping companies are also incapable of investing in ports because of their natural advantages in terms of transport capacity and supply. More to let.

In the recent port investment, COSCO Group, one of the largest shipping companies in China, is playing an increasingly important role. At present, COSCO’s Hong Kong-listed company, COSCO Pacific, mainly participates in Shanghai Pudong International Container Terminal, Yantian International Container Terminal, Shekou Container Ma No, Shanghai Container Terminal, Zhangjiagang Yongjia Container Terminal, Dalian Container and Qingdao Yungang International Container, Hong Kong River Terminals, COSCO International Container Terminals (Hong Kong) and other terminal operators.

"COSCO Pacific's investment in the port is very beneficial to COSCO Logistics' expansion of the logistics industry." The manager of COSCO Logistics said to the correspondent. In September 2003, COSCO Pacific Limited announced that it had purchased 49% of COSCO Logistics, a wholly-owned subsidiary of COSCO Group, for RMB 1.18 billion. The analysis pointed out that COSCO Pacific holds a certain proportion in the port terminal, which virtually allows COSCO Logistics to have more advantages in carrying out its business, including transportation, customs clearance and cargo haulage.

The advantages of shipping companies investing in ports also seem to have accelerated the transformation of Hwang. In June 2004, Li Ka-shing purchased a 20% stake in Hyundai Merchant Shipping, the second-largest shipping company in South Korea, at a price of HK$6. Hutchison transformed itself into an internationally-linked port and shipping company in a traditional sense. Shipowner. "The practice of Hutchison represents a trend in the port industry," said one person in Shenzhen who has long been engaged in the terminal business. He believes that the future of port investment is increasingly valued by shipping companies, and the port itself expects the source of the goods they bring.

In spite of this, China's port companies are still dominated by local port authorities, and the investment path of foreign capital in China's port terminals also proves this point.

Before 1986, the Chinese government prohibited foreign capital from participating in port construction. Almost 100% of the nation’s port construction was invested by the state. As a result of more control over the construction of ports, the result is that the supply of terminals is in short supply. In 1986, the State Council promulgated the Provisional Regulations on the preferential treatment for the construction of terminals by Chinese-foreign joint ventures, and the port construction began to be opened to foreign capital. In December 1987, the Nanjing Port Authority and the United States Insina Port Co., Ltd. jointly established Nanjing International Container Handling Co., Ltd., becoming China's first Sino-foreign joint venture terminal enterprise.

From then on until 1993, a number of container terminal enterprises were successively established by joint ventures in Nanjing, Tianjin, Guangdong, Fuzhou and Zhangjiagang. However, these enterprises are not large in size and are based on the “Foreign Investment Industry Catalog” promulgated by the State Department in the mid-1980s. No foreign company’s share of the joint venture company exceeds 49%.

“我们仅仅使策略投资者而已。”这是记者在采访多家中外资港口码头企业时听到的声音。以天津港东突堤码头建设投资为例，天津港务局持股40%，中远、中海、招商局各持14%，美国环球货柜持18%。对于天津港而言，吸引外资相当于企业进行的一场私募。

虽然没有控制权，但这依然挡不住外资们投资中国港口的热情。青岛港与世界三大航运巨头签署的合资协议中，外资占了6亿多美元，这个数目几乎已经是16年来所有进入中国港口业外资的一半。该项目理所当然地引起了世界航运业的高度关注。与青岛港合资的三方股东均是世界级航运巨头。丹麦马士基、英国铁行分别是世界第一和第二大航运企业。

不过，股权松动的迹象也在出现。从2002年4月1日起，根据国家计委、国家经贸委最新颁布的《外商投资产业指导目录》，我国取消了港口共用码头的中方控股要求。迹象还表明，外商独资可能将出现。上海方面曾宣称，“将允许外资设立独资码头，世界知名航运及码头公司既可以使用公共码头，也可以使用自己的码头”。 这个试点可能是上海外高桥集装箱码头第四期项目。外高桥码头第四期共有6个泊位，兴建费约42亿元人民币。

据统计，2004年，国家港口建设投资约300亿，2003年为200亿，其增长速度接近50%。有专家概算：建设1万TEU集装箱码头设计规模，沿海和长江中下游港口需2000万元左右，而长江上游则高达3000万元以上；按平均投资2500万／万TEU计，故1.2亿标箱总投资约为3000亿，目前集装箱已完成7600万标箱建设，光此项资金缺口约为1100亿。

而这笔巨额资金单靠各地港务集团或者政府是难以买单的。2004年1月1日正式实施的《港口法》，其不仅填补了我国17年港口业法律的空白之外，还明确规定了“国家鼓励国内外经济组织和个人依法投资建设、经营港口，保护投资者的合法权益”，而这意味着中国将向外资更大程度地开放港口经营。

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