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CHINA's
big three container ports, Shanghai, Hong
Kong and Shenzhen, have enjoyed a container
throughput growth of 289 per cent from 1997
to 2007 that accounted for 64.5 per cent
of Chinese volume in 2001 with Hong Kong
alone contributing 39.3 per cent of it.
But
as manufacturing has moved from the coast
and spread inland where labour is more affordable,
second tier ports of Ningbo, Qingdao, Tianjin,
Xiamen, Guangzhou, Dalian, Yingkou and Lianyungang
- still in China's top 10 - are enjoying
the big growth - 14.7 per cent in 2007-12
against 4.1 per cent for the big three.
Indeed,
Hong Kong saw container throughput fall
by 5.3 per cent in 2012, while lifts were
down 5.8 per cent year on year over the
first 10 months of 2013, reports London
shipbrokers Clarksons.
While
a dock strike contributed to the shortfall,
the broader cause of the continuing decline
in 2013 is the strong competition from smaller
ports in the Pearl River Delta, as well
as the gradual shift of manufacturing from
the region to the interior. Indeed Hong
Kong's neighbour, Shenzhen, has also experienced
lacklustre growth - just 0.5 per cent year
on year in 2013.
Much
of this growth was driven by the proximity
to new centres of Chinese manufacturing
growth such as the Yangtze River Delta and
northern economic zones. Even rising overland
demand from Russia, Central Asia and now
from western Europe with new rail freight
services, box volumes are taken from the
big three coastal ports.
In
2012, mainland China's second tier ports
saw their combined annual throughput (83.1
million TEU) surpass that of the top three
for the first time, a gap that will expand
in 2013, as handling at the ports grew 5.5
per cent year on year in 2013 through October,
compared to a 0.1 per cent decline for the
top three.
But
this shifting port growth will not stop
here, says Clarksons. So far in 2013 throughput
growth at smaller ports outside the top
10 has outpaced that at the larger, due
to more established facilities. In future,
the key sources of Chinese throughput growth
look likely to be found further down the
port hierarchy.
The
rapid development of Chinese manufacturing
over the last couple of decades drove the
dramatic expansion of containerised exports,
necessitating the swift development of Chinese
container ports.
By
2012, TEU lifts at Chinese mainland ports
accounted for 30 per cent of global lifts,
more than double their share in 2001, when
China entered the World Trade Organisation
(WTO). When throughput at the port of Hong
Kong is included, China's share of global
lifts last year reached 33 per cent.
In
2012, Chinese mainland port volume reached
176.5 million TEU, up from just 27.5 million
TEU in 2001. Including Hong Kong, there
are now a total of 23 Chinese ports with
annual throughput of more than one million
TEU, bringing total lifts at Chinese ports
to 199.6 million TEU last year.
As
a result of this rapid expansion, there
are now 10 Chinese ports in the global top
20, and seven in the top 10 with Shanghai
leading at 32.5 million TEU in 2012, making
it the world's busiest container port.
The
great lament of yesteryear, that economic
activity was restricted to coastal regions,
leaving the Chinese interior bereft of opportunity,
is no longer the case, or at least not nearly
as much as it was because more and more
low-end industries have been attracted to
inland cities and towns.
Moreover,
throughout this period China has been laying
in road, rail and waterway infrastructure
that links affordable labour and factories
to the means of exporting goods overseas
at competitive prices that get them to western
retail shelves, and increasingly to a burgeoning
domestic consumer market linked to e-commerce
delivery.
So
while China is lifting as many boxes as
ever - even more - the big three of Shanghai,
Hong Kong and Shenzhen - are not keeping
pace with the growth of smaller ports that
find themselves closer to the new inland
factories.
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