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Developing China’s Ports
coordinate information and financial flows throughout the entire supply chain, improving efficiency and transparency while lowering costs. Recent examples from two ports appear in box 2.11. As with the rest of the world, China’s maritime trade and economic growth slowed following the 2008 global financial crisis. The early focus on port construction had led to overcapacity in ports, but also to intense competition between them. The shift in the balance of power toward shipping companies and cargo owners pushed ports to introduce client-oriented services. At the same time, increases in ship size (especially container ships) were straining ports’ collection and distribution systems. These challenges further motivated China’s port sector to embrace new technologies. After 2011, ports began to apply the Internet of Things, cloud computing, and big data, among others, to develop high-end services and further increase their competitiveness. The Twelfth Five-Year Development Plan for Highway and Waterway Traffic Informatization (2011–15) called for the continuous integration of information resources, but also highlighted the expansion of ICT systems into other parts of the logistics network (such as the hinterland transport systems), as well as the use of ICT for monitoring safety and security in transport networks and ports (Ministry of Transport 2011). To date, innovations include terminal automation, collaborative logistics chains, and big data usage. By accumulating system operations data, port enterprises are capable of big-data-driven analysis, thereby proactively providing the
BOX 2.11
Two examples of digitalization initiatives from the ports of Xiamen and Shanghai Xiamen: Digitalization of documentation The Port of Xiamen introduced a digital equipment identity register system in 2016, after two years of research and development. A digital equipment identity register minimizes, if not eliminates, repeated entry. It has eliminated huge numbers of staff for document preparation and delivery and who work at the gate, thus significantly reducing the cost of labor. In total, the digital transformation has benefited 13 shipping companies, 48 yards outside the port, 514 transportation companies (with 9,981 vehicles and 9,182 drivers registered), 6 terminal companies, and 1 inland port. As the equipment identity register turns digital, the efficiency of information exchange has been enhanced significantly between the terminals and stations, logistics parks, inland ports, and port authorities. Based on the system, the dispatch of on-site trailers can be more efficient, thus cutting management costs for vehicles, relieving road congestion within the port, and contributing remarkably to energy savings
and emissions reduction. At the terminal gate, document handover is now based on an automatic identification system and in digital form instead of on paper, raising traffic efficiency by 67 percent. Currently, most of China’s major coastal ports have transformed to paperless on-site operations mode. Shanghai: Collaboration between river and ocean transport, and between port and city Shanghai is the world’s largest container port. Because much of its throughput is moved inland through the waterway system along the Yangtze River, the Port of Shanghai has built an operations platform for r iver-sea transport that includes systems for loading, unloading, and customs processing (photo B2.11.1). The platform enables all transport partners to visualize the entire logistics process. A collaborative platform for container collection and distribution has also been developed. Users can continued
