The central government will pour huge amounts of cash into ports to improve handling capacity and allow it to keep up with rising demand.

 

That was the promise of a senior transportation official in an exclusive interview with China Daily on Friday during the annual session of the National People's Congress, the top legislature.

 

Three clusters of ports will take shape in the next five years, in Bohai Bay, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Pearl River Delta. The aim is to improve trading capacity and make the Chinese coast home to some of the world's largest trading ports.

 

Qian Yongchang, chairman of China Communications and Transportation Association, said China has boasted the world's largest cargo throughput since 2004, and Shanghai is the world's largest port in handling tonnage.

 

But handling capacity still needs to catch up with rising demand, said the former minister of communications. So, the nation will increase cargo handling capacity on the Chinese mainland from 3.8 billion tons in 2005 to 5 billion tons in 2010.

 

According to the Ministry of Communications, during the same period, the total throughput of containers, measured in TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units), will increase from 74.41 million in 2005 to 130 million in 2010.

 

The country already owns 10 of the world's 25 largest sea ports.

 

Qian said almost all of the major coastal ports are expected to undergo expansion in the next few years. But the port development program will focus on the transportation of containers and on raw materials like metal ore, coal, and crude oil.

 

Shanghai will serve as the pillar of East China's port cluster around the Yangtze River Delta, while Dalian, Tianjin and Qingdao will form the three most important hubs around Bohai Bay in North China.

 

Hong Kong, the world's second largest container terminal after Singapore, is not counted as part of the trading capacity of the Chinese mainland. But it is set to become the center of China's southern port cluster with back-up from Guangzhou and Shenzhen, the world's fourth-largest container port.

 

Port facilities in Shanghai, Tianjin, Guangzhou, Ningbo, Qingdao, Dalian, and Shenzhen will all see major building work, added Qian.

 

After the port expansion program is complete, the Chinese mainland will have the capacity to handle an additional 82 million TEUs, 330 million tons of coal, 350 tons of metal ore and 80 million tons of crude oil in 2010.

 

Coal transportation capacity will be concentrated in North China's ports including Qinhuangdao, Tangshan and Huanghua in Hebei Province and Dalian.

 

Crude oil capacity will be expanded in Qingdao and Huizhou in Guangdong Province.

 

And key cities for adding more container handling capacity will be Shanghai, Dalian, Tianjin and Shenzhen.

 

In the last two decades, multinational firms and the lifting of trade barriers have made coastal regions China's economic powerhouses.

 

It took Shanghai port only five years to double cargo handling capacity from 200 million tons to 400 million tons. The city's cargo handling record was 443 million tons in 2005.

 

However, there is still a big gap between Shanghai and Singapore in container handling capacity. The latest statistics show that Shanghai handled 18.09 million TEUs in 2005, rising 24.2 percent on the previous year. In contrast, Singapore handled 21.2 million TEUs in the first 11 months of 2005, up 8.4 percent.

 

Qian urged China to build more factories near its coastlines and main rivers. He quoted figures showing that the money spent on logistics in China accounted for 30 percent of the aggregate cost of goods, 10 percent higher than in developed countries.

 

Armed with adequate technology for environmental protection, he said, coastal regions and the Yangtze River, China's longest waterway, should be top choices for industrial and manufacturing bases because of their transportation connections which give them easy access to the world market.

 

(China Daily March 11, 2006)