Shanghai becomes the world’s third ranked shipping center
July 14, 2020 Category China News Round-up, Weekly
For the first time in six years, Shanghai has become one of the world’s top three shipping centers, an industry report showed. Shanghai ranked third in the 2020 Xinhua-Baltic Exchange International Shipping Center Development Index, second only to Singapore and London. The report measures port facilities, shipping services and comprehensive shipping resources. Analysts said Shanghai’s ranking was due to its improved soft power in terms of enhanced high-end shipping services. “In recent years, China has also been attaching importance to the development of shipping services and comprehensive shipping resources, striving to improve customs clearance efficiency and reduce logistics costs at ports,” Zhou Dequan, Research Fellow with the Shanghai International Shipping Institute, told the Global Times. Wu Minghua, a Shanghai-based independent shipping industry analyst, said the change in the global top three ranking is significant. Hong Kong moved up from third place before 2018 to second place in 2019, before falling out of the top three in 2020. “Shanghai now beats Hong Kong in many sub-indexes,” Wu said.
In the future, Shanghai is likely to surpass London and Singapore as the top international shipping center, Bai Ming, Research Fellow at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, predicted. “Becoming an international shipping center represents a comprehensive manifestation of economic development and the level of opening up of a country,” Bai told the Global Times. Nearly half of the world’s top 100 container lines have opened branches in Shanghai while the municipality’s shipping and cargo insurance business accounted for about one-quarter of the national total with world-leading business volumes. In addition to Shanghai, Chinese cities including Zhoushan in Zhejiang province, Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province and Qingdao in Shandong province, were placed at 11, 13 and 15.
Analysts said that Shanghai has many areas where it must improve before it can challenge London, the leader in global high-end shipping services, or Singapore, which boasts all-round strengths. Wu said Shanghai still lags behind in maritime arbitration, insurance and finance. “In terms of maritime arbitration, for instance, Shanghai settled less than 100 cases last year while London settled several thousand, while Singapore remains the global shipping center of Asia,” Wu said, as reported by the Global Times.
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