Duty-free shopping for cruise liner passengers

A DUTY-FREE store for cruise liner passengers will open at the Wusongkou International Cruise Terminal in Baoshan District before the second China International Import Expo in November, authorities announced yesterday.

The 1,700-square-meter store will mainly serve inbound passengers and it will be China’s first inbound duty-free store at a cruise port, said Su Ping, Baoshan’s deputy governor.

It is part of efforts to fuel the cruise economy and build an international cruise city.

A number of measures such as a bar code for easy customs clearance to improve clearance efficiency at the cruise port have been taken.

“An electronic cruise ship ticket system will be implemented, allowing passengers to board ships with an electronic code in the future, and the code will be linked with luggage codes for easy baggage loading and review,” said Zhang Lin, deputy director of the Shanghai Transportation Commission.

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism recently gave the nod for the city to create the nation’s first “cruise liner tourism development demonstration zone”.

The city’s cultural and tourism authorities said more cruiserelated tourism itineraries will be developed in Shanghai.

Welcoming ceremonies featuring lion dances, Peking opera and folk music have been hosted for passengers from 12 visiting cruise ships between January and August and more than 10,000 foreign passengers have received paper-cuts, Chinese knots and dough modeling souvenirs with a local flavor, the Shanghai Administration of Culture and Tourism said.