Shanghai handled 5.89 million cargo containers in the first
quarter this year, an increase of 28.1 percent from a year before,
ranking its throughput second in the world after Singapore for the
first time, Jiefang Daily reported Wednesday.
Singapore maintained its No. 1 position with throughput of 6.58
million 20-foot containers in the quarter, while the figure for
Hong Kong rose 2.3 percent to 5.50 million containers, the report
said.
As the powerhouse of Shanghai's port industry, Yangshan
Deep-Water Port achieved record cargo throughput of 420,000
containers in March, up nearly 100 percent year on year. It handled
1.22 million containers in the first three months of the year, the
local port authority said Wednesday.
The port achieved 145,000 containers of water-to-water
transshipments in March, accounting for 34.53 percent of its cargo
throughput.
Altogether 563 ships docked at the port in March, including 181
vessels sailing on major international sea routes.
The deep-water port is at the mouth of the Yangtze River, about
45 kilometers from the Pudong International Airport. It is designed
to have an annual handling capacity of 25 million containers when
the entire project is completed in 2020.
Shanghai will start to upgrade inner river services such as the
Hangzhou-Shanghai Line and Suzhou-Shanghai Outer Port Line this
year, said Xu Peixing, director of the Shanghai Municipal Port
Administration.
(Shanghai Daily April 26, 2007)