Revenue from China’s postal services jumped by 22.3% in 2011 to CNY15.6 billion. Half of the revenue (CNY7.58 billion) came from the express business, up 32% year-on-year. Revenue from the international express business in 2011 accounted for only 24.4% of the industry’s total, declining 6.7 percentage points from the previous year. Geologically, East China accounts for 81.1% of the country’s total express business revenue, almost unchanged from 2010. In comparison, Central China took up 9.9% and West China 9%. The market was partly driven by the country’s booming e-commerce industry. The country’s total online shopping revenue reached CNY800 billion in 2011, said He Liming, Chairman of the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing. This generated a total business volume of 3.65 billion pieces of express mail and parcels, He said. Analysts said logistics services need to be further improved and might hold back the development of the country’s robust e-commerce industry. In 2011, the country’s total logistics costs increased by 12%.

A South Korean cargo ship that allegedly spilled phenol into the Yangtze river causing water pollution was detained and the owners of the vessel could face trial. The Wuhan Maritime Court, which has jurisdiction over the waters in the region, ordered the detention of the cargo ship Gloria, which was docked at the city of Nantong in Jiangsu province in early Feburary. Bail of CNY20.6 million has been set. The ship spilled the chemical into the river through underwater pipes. A court official said the shipping company would not face trial if a compensation agreement was reached with the local water supply company. The ship, which on February 2 was docked in Zhenjiang, leaked phenol on February 2 and 3 due to a faulty valve. Following the leak residents of Zhenjiang, a city of 3 million people, reported that their tap water had a pungent smell. The drinking water supply returned to normal on February 4.

Samho Dream, a supertanker under arrest in Hong Kong since October for non-payment of a bank loan, has been sold at auction for USD29 million, a fraction of the USD137.5 million the distressed South Korean owner paid for the ship in 2008. The ship was bought by London’s Embiricos Shipbrokers on behalf of the owner of a Greek ship management company. The shipbroker confirmed it acted as agent for the new owner, which it declined to name. The buyer is thought to be linked to the Embiricos shipping dynasty, one of Greece’s largest shipowners. Hong Kong shipbrokers estimated the ship was worth USD35 million to USD40 million before the vessel was sold in an auction ordered by the court in December. Seven bids were received when tenders closed, but all were under the USD30 million reserve price fixed after two valuations of the tanker by a shipbroker and surveyor. Admiralty Judge Anselmo Reyes decided to sell the ship rather than seek new valuations and tenders. The ship hit the headlines in November 2010 when Samho paid a record USD9.5 million to get the hijacked tanker and 24 crew members freed from Somali pirates. The tanker was transporting crude oil from Iraq to the United States when it was hijacked in April 2010. Samho acquired the 319,360 DWT very large crude carrier (VLCC) at the height of the shipping boom in early 2008 from Greek shipowner Dynacom using a USD120 million loan from a syndicate led by South Korea’s Shinhan Bank. Lawyers from the Hong Kong office of Holman Fenwick Willan, acting on behalf of Shinhan Bank, had the tanker arrested on arrival in Hong Kong on October 18 last year after Samho had filed for bankruptcy, the South China Morning Post reports.

Slowing global trade this year will force China’s ports to scale back investment in container terminals, but investment in bulk-cargo terminals should continue, analysts say. Container throughput this year in Hong Kong, the world’s third-busiest port, will match last year’s at best and could even shrink, said Sunny Ho, Executive Director of the Hong Kong Shippers’ Council. “Southern China is suffering from a surge in labor costs and the impact of contracting demand in Europe and the U.S.,” Ho said. Guotai Junan Analyst James Song forecast container throughput growth at Chinese ports would be roughly 5 percentage points lower than last year’s growth of nearly 12%. The growth in annual cargo throughput at Chinese ports and in the rest of Asia would be 3% to 5% for last year and this year, JP Morgan Analyst Karen Li predicted. “Globally, it will be even lower,” she added. Throughput growth at Chinese ports was 11.6% last year and 18.6% in 2010. In 2009, amid the global financial crisis, the cargo throughput of Chinese ports fell 5.9%, Li said. “Port operators will focus on the bottom line this year. Some Chinese ports will delay some projects.” For example, Shenzhen’s Yantian port is building three container terminals to be completed in 2013, 2014 and 2015. Li expects the completion of the container terminal originally scheduled for 2015 to be delayed. No new container terminal projects had been approved recently in Shenzhen, said Luo Ping, Transport Planning Director of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). “Ongoing container projects in Chinese ports may slow down due to the slowdown in global trade,” Luo said. “Some new container projects in Chinese ports may not be approved,” the South China Morning Post reports. But Chinese ports would continue to build facilities for coal and iron ore, as iron-ore handling capacity was far from sufficient to meet demand, Luo said. This year, ports would focus on upgrading bulk-cargo capacity, such as the recently announced plan to build a 300,000 DWT berth in Tianjin, said Charles de Trenck, Transport Analyst at Transport Trackers, a Hong Kong shipping consultancy. Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH) and Modern Terminals, two Hong Kong port operators with operations in Hong Kong and Shenzhen, declined to say whether they would delay port projects.

Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL) has secured a key vote from harbor commissioners in the port of Long Beach, California, for its USD4.6 billion, 40-year lease on a new container terminal. It would be the largest port lease deal in United States history. If approved, executives from OOCL and the port would sign the formal lease agreement later this month. Under the plan, the port would spend USD1.2 billion to merge two existing container terminals into a 122 hectare terminal complex capable of handling 3 million TEU a year. OOCL already operates one of the terminals, the Long Beach Container Terminal. The second one, California United Terminals, was operated by South Korea’s Hyundai Merchant Marine until late 2010 when it moved to Los Angeles. The capacity of the new complex, which includes the construction of 1.4 km of new wharves, rail facilities and 37 container-storage areas, would be equivalent to half the 6.1 million TEU handled by Long Beach in 2011 last year. Chris Lytle, Executive Director at the Long Beach port, said if the planned terminal were an independent port, it would be the U.S.’s fourth largest behind Los Angeles, Long Beach and New York-New Jersey. OOCL also plans to spend USD500 million to equip the new terminal with modern, less-polluting cargo-handling and port equipment, including replacing diesel-powered cranes with electric ones. Anthony Otto, President of Long Beach Container Terminal, said OOCL would approach other container lines, including its partners in the Grand Alliance shipping group, to share the complex. He also did not rule out the possibility that OOCL might seek a second shareholder in its terminal, the South China Morning Post reports.