Why can foreign liner ships from Los Angeles, USA load Chinese domestic trade goods? Yangshan Port carries 16000 TEUs per year... domestic trade | foreign shipping | US | Maersk | Yangshan Port | international transshipment | South Korea | Singapore | coastal transportation
Last June, Maersk's cargo ship, carrying 725 tons of green peas, departed from Yangshan Port and headed to the destination Tianjin Port, marking the official landing of China's first foreign liner "coastal pick-up" business in Shanghai. On June 12, 88 containers were transferred from Yangshan Port to Tianjin Port by the cargo ship "Manchester Maersk", becoming the 65th ship of the company to "carry goods along the coast" in Yangshan Port.
Li Chunyang, Deputy Director of Yangshan Customs, introduced that since the first order landed last year, the scale of Yangshan Port's "coastal transportation" business has been increasing month by month. As of the end of May this year, the total transportation volume of the business has reached 16000 TEUs.
"Coastal transportation" refers to the domestic transportation of foreign trade containers between coastal ports in China, which is an important breakthrough in the opening up of China's international shipping industry. According to previous regulations, foreign international ship operators are not allowed to operate ship transportation business between Chinese ports. Taking a foreign liner from Los Angeles, USA to China as an example, it can berth successively in Ningbo, Shanghai, Qingdao, and Tianjin in China. If this ship can do "coastal transportation", it can load domestic trade goods with a destination of Qingdao Port at Ningbo Port, improving cargo turnover and transportation efficiency. In the original situation of "internal and external differences", this batch of domestic trade goods can only be transported by domestic trade ships and must be anchored at specialized domestic trade terminals.
The container volume of Shanghai Port has been ranked first in the world for 13 consecutive years, with a throughput exceeding 47.3 million TEUs in 2022. However, at the same time, Shanghai Port is also taking advantage of its dense route network and high schedule density to strengthen its resource allocation capabilities. It is reported that the proportion of international transshipment and international consolidated container load (LCL) at Yangshan Deepwater Port has reached 17%. The landing of "coastal transportation" business can attract overseas shipping companies to transfer international transshipment business from traditional transshipment ports such as Busan and Singapore to Shanghai, undoubtedly strengthening the hub level of Shanghai Port.
The Yangshan Phase IV of Shanghai Yangshan Port is currently the largest and most intelligent automated container terminal in the world. Last year, it handled 6.35 million TEUs and, on its own, managed to handle 13% of the container throughput of the entire Shanghai Port. This is based on the dense air routes and innovative policies, combined with the advantages of "smart ports". The increasingly excellent business environment of Shanghai Port has led foreign shipping companies to pay more attention to the domestic market in China and actively optimize their route layout and flexibly allocate shipping resources. According to Yang Jikun, the second level organizer of the Comprehensive Business Department of Yangshan Customs, the "Coastal Carrier" has been continuously adjusting its transit routes since its landing for a year. Currently, the number of ships registered with Shanghai Customs has increased from the initial 44 to 94.
