Shipping "the Belt and Road" helps China's shipping industry break through

The dawn of global shipping industry recovery is shining in the East.

In recent years, the Baltic Sea Shipping Index (BDI) has dropped from over 10000 points during the oil burning period to a peak of over 500 points, causing widespread distress in global shipping and a slump in port trade.

However, at a time when the world was silent and ten thousand horses were silent, a spark ignited in the east.

Against the backdrop of the continued weakness of the global economy and the sluggish growth of international trade, the "the Belt and Road" strategy proposed by China not only activates the port trade of China and countries along the Belt and Road, but also establishes the inevitable trend of the eastward shift of the global shipping center.

Since April this year, the "the Belt and Road" research and report team of Shanghai Securities News has visited more than 10 domestic ports in more than four months, including Beihai, Qinzhou, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Xiamen, Quanzhou, Fuzhou, Ningbo, Shanghai, Tianjin, etc., measuring the development of China's shipping port industry with both feet, and feeling the pulse of the revival of China's shipping port industry.

In Guangzhou, the reporter saw the development speed of COSCO Shipping's transformation into special equipment shipping; In Beihai and Qinzhou, the reporter saw the Beibu Gulf Port building a new model of joint construction of ports along the route for countries; In Ningbo, the reporter saw a unique port economic circle paving the way for a new "Ningbo Port Speed"

Eastward shift of center of gravity: various regions strive to build international shipping centers

At the Ningbo Port Phase III Terminal in Beilun District, Ningbo City, a continuous stream of trucks are waiting for the loading and unloading of container goods that have drifted across the sea from here. From a distance across the sea, the outlines of islands such as Jintang Island and Meishan Island are clearly visible, with bridges flying over both sides.

This is an ordinary shot captured by the reporter walking on the dock of Ningbo Port.

If we switch the camera to the map of global ports, Ningbo Port also occupies a pivotal position. In 2014, the cargo throughput of Ningbo Port exceeded 526 million tons, ranking the third in Chinese Mainland and the fourth in the world; The container throughput of Ningbo Port reached 18.7 million TEUs, up 11.5% year on year. The container volume growth ranked first among the major coastal ports in mainland China, and the container volume ranked third among the ports in Chinese Mainland. It also surpassed Busan Port for the first time and entered the top five ports in the world.

Ningbo Port has become a landmark case of China's port development under the "the Belt and Road" strategy, and a microcosm of the eastward shift of international shipping center.

In the past year, the three major shipping sectors of container, dry bulk, and liquid bulk have all shown a trend of the world's shipping center shifting eastward, "said Liu Qianwen, Managing Director of Drury China, a shipping brokerage and consulting firm, to reporters.

With the acceleration of the construction of the "the Belt and Road", Liu Qianwen's views have increasingly become the consensus of the international shipping industry.

Recently, the Index Research Institute of the National Financial Information Center and the Baltic Exchange jointly released the "Xinhua Baltic International Shipping Center Development Index Report" in Shanghai, which showed that the Asia Pacific region accounted for six of the top ten international shipping centers in the world, and the trend of the world's shipping center moving eastward was obvious.

According to the report, the top ten international shipping center cities in the world are Singapore, London, Hong Kong, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Dubai, Shanghai, Tokyo, New York, and Busan.

According to experts from the Index Research Institute of the National Financial Information Center, the distribution of sample cities also indicates that international shipping centers are shifting towards the Asia Pacific region. According to statistics, among the 46 sample cities, Asia, Europe, and the Americas account for 39%, 26%, and 21%, respectively.

In terms of containers, although there has been a trend of some global manufacturing capacity shifting to Southeast Asia in recent years, China's position as a major manufacturing country will not change, which has driven the rapid development of container transportation. In terms of dry bulk cargo, the main type of cargo is iron ore. Driven by factors such as infrastructure construction and accelerated urbanization, China's iron ore imports account for nearly 70% of the world's total. From this perspective, China is the leading force in the eastward shift of the world's shipping center. From the perspective of liquid bulk cargo, Asian countries' demand for petrochemical energy is rigid and stable, and Japan and China's energy demand will play an increasingly important role in global demand, "said Liu Qianwen.

Against the backdrop of the eastward shift of the shipping center of gravity, major coastal ports in China are accelerating construction, innovating development models, and striving to become new international shipping centers.

Performance recovery: unique "business strategy" of Chinese airlines

If Senior Captain Lao Wu, who has fair skin and a rosy complexion, does not actively introduce his career, it is difficult for others to imagine that he has sailed in the sea for 16 years.

Under the new historical opportunity, this senior captain of COSCO Shipping and other captain colleagues bid farewell to the early transportation of low-end goods such as clothing and food, and embarked on a new journey.

Over the years, the new mission undertaken by Lao Wu and his colleagues has been to build COSCO Shipping into the most competitive specialized shipping company and become the leader in the transportation of equipment for large-scale engineering projects.

Behind this lies a larger development logic: whether China's shipping industry can redraw the world map requires at least two pillars: the construction of international good ports and the strength of local shipping companies.

What is the current situation of local airlines? From a performance perspective, since the beginning of this year, the performance of Chinese shipping listed companies has led the global industry recovery; With the gradual disclosure of the semi annual report, the attitude of accelerating improvement in the second quarter has become increasingly clear, becoming a beautiful scenery in the global shipping industry.

According to statistics from reporters, as of July 30th, among the 13 listed shipping companies on the A-share market, 8 have disclosed their 2015 semi annual performance forecasts or express reports. Except for * ST Phoenix, which slightly decreased, all others are expected to be happy. Among them, 1 has slightly increased, 3 have turned losses around, and 3 have increased significantly.

From a business perspective, the transformation and upgrading of COSCO Shipping can be considered a landmark case.

The reporter learned from on-site interviews in Guangzhou that COSCO Shipping has a special transport fleet with a scale and comprehensive strength that ranks among the top in the world. It operates and manages more than 100 multi-purpose and heavy lift ships, semi submersible ships, automobile ships, timber ships, asphalt ships and other types of ships with a load capacity of over 2 million tons. It has formed a stable and reliable advantage in liner transportation on routes such as Far East to Mediterranean, Far East to Europe, Far East to Persian Gulf, Far East to America, and Far East to Africa.

This shipping company, which mainly engages in special ship transportation, has ushered in a huge historical opportunity for Chinese enterprises to go global, especially for Chinese equipment. COSCO Shipping is known by the capital market as the leader of the "the Belt and Road" maritime transport.

2014 was the "year of high-speed rail" for this company, which acquired a total of 1178 railway locomotives for transportation, a year-on-year increase of more than three times. At the same time, the company also consolidated its wind power marketing effectiveness, tracking 25 wind power projects and carrying a total of 800000 cubic meters of related business. And we have comprehensively strengthened the marketing of nuclear power engineering projects, with clients including Nuclear Power Corporation, China General Nuclear Power Corporation, and National Nuclear Power Corporation.

Accelerating business adjustment and transformation in advance, and seizing the historical opportunity of China's equipment manufacturing industry going global, is the key to the success of this company. Taking the restructuring of the company's fleet as an example, from 2007 to April 2015, the company added a total of 34 new ships and retired 63 ships. At present, there are 18 orders under construction, including semi submersible ships, new multi-purpose ships, heavy lift ships, and asphalt ships.

The adjustment of fleet structure brings about the transformation and upgrading of transportation capacity structure, customer structure, source structure, and even internal marketing mechanisms and network construction. The executives of the company admitted that they did not expect to encounter such a great historical opportunity at the beginning. The series of adjustments to the fleet structure in the early stage were to cope with the changes in the entire shipping market.

"We are not the forerunner of the" the Belt and Road "strategy, but we are the most closely serving actors of the" the Belt and Road "strategy," said the head of COSCO Shipping.

It is worth noting that this company is transforming from a simple maritime transportation to a provider of full process logistics and overall transportation solutions for engineering projects, "transportation+installation" services for marine goods, and EPC general contracting business.

Long road ahead: Competition remains fierce during the strategic investment period

Looking back at history, the development of major shipping centers around the world has gone through three levels: basic shipping, service shipping, and intelligent shipping. These three aspects of business capabilities determine whether a shipping center is production-oriented, service-oriented, or knowledge-based.

After four months of on-site visits, the reporter also found that most ports in China are still in the transition stage from production-oriented to service-oriented, and the road ahead is long and arduous.

At the beginning of August, the Shanghai Shipping Exchange officially piloted the "the Belt and Road" shipping index, the "the Belt and Road" freight trade index and the "Maritime Silk Road" freight price index.

Specifically, the "the Belt and Road" freight trade index reached a high of 100 points in January this year, dropped to about 85 points in February, climbed to more than 95 points in April, fell back to 95 points in May, approached 100 points in June, and failed to break through 100 points in half a year. People from the Air Transport Exchange told reporters that the first quarter fell sharply, and the second quarter recovered steadily. Among them, the trade volume between China and Mongolia and Russia rose 12% in June from the beginning of the year.

The "Belt and Road" freight volume index in the "the Belt and Road" freight trade index fell slightly in the first quarter and rose steadily in the second quarter, thanks to the rapid growth of freight volume of China Europe regular trains; The overall trend of the "One Road" freight volume index has fluctuated and adjusted in the first half of this year, especially with the overall decline in imported bulk cargo volume in May and a slight rebound in June, mainly due to the steady increase in Shanghai's export container volume.

The performance of the "Maritime Silk Road" comprehensive freight index was significantly weak, almost declining from January to June, but fortunately showing a rebound in July.

When the reporter investigated in Beihai Port, Tianjin Port, Ningbo Port and other places, local leaders said to the reporter that the "the Belt and Road" strategy is still in the investment period, and the future competition pressure is still huge. The "Maritime Silk Road" has both partners and competitors, and shipping companies need to seek benefits and avoid harm. "Singapore Port is the leader in the shipping industry, and its mentality is not to play with us. Busan Port in South Korea is our competitor; Malaysia's port has an iron ore transit terminal built by Brazil's Vale, and of course, it does not want 400000 ton iron ore ships to dock at our port

Based on this, the reporter learned that the heads of several leading domestic airlines intend to speak to relevant government departments to consider the overall planning of trade, shipping, and finance.

The strategy of domestic ports attracting waterless ports has emerged. Ningbo Port has established waterless ports in dozens of cities in mainland China, implementing sea rail intermodal transportation. Without a seaport in Xi'an, an international port area will be established to cooperate with multiple coastal ports and shipping companies to develop the port economy. The Belt and Road Initiative are strategically linked together.

In the distant 13th century, Italian traveler Marco Polo traveled along the overland Silk Road to the East and recorded in his travelogue the prosperity of Quanzhou Port in China: "Alexander or other ports carried pepper on a ship to various Christian countries, and even to this port of Citong, there were over a hundred ships sailing back and forth like a shuttle. It was his admiration for the port of Tsukishima, also known as the city of Izumi, that sparked Columbus' voyage to search for the "City of Light," bringing about the great geographical discoveries of the world and opening the door to the development of modern shipping industry.

Today, as the reporter walks from the ruins of the ancient Citong Port to the new Quanzhou Port, and enters the coastal ports of China, the prosperity of the atmosphere once again hits us. The "the Belt and Road" strategy will eventually help China redraw the world shipping map.