Strong shipping ties to chart growth for global supply chain
HONG KONG: Promoting international shipping cooperation is of great importance in ensuring the smooth flow of global logistics supply chains and boosting the global economy amid an increasingly complex market environment, according to officials and industry players.
Delivering his speech at the opening session of the two-day second world maritime merchants forum on Tuesday, Dai Dongchang, vice-minister of the Transport Ministry equated transport with the artery of an economy and a bond between civilisations.
The shipping industry, as an important part of transportation, plays an irreplaceable role in serving world economic development and global trade.
Dai said China is ready to work with other countries to promote global shipping cooperation as well as strengthen connectivity in both infrastructure and systems to keep industrial and supply chains secure and smooth.
China has become the most connected country in shipping, boasting the world’s second-largest maritime team, Dai told the forum.
“China cannot develop itself in isolation from the rest of the world while the world also needs China for its prosperity,” he said.
Last month, the global sustainable transport innovation and knowledge centre was established as the country’s key move to support the implementation of the United Nations 2030 agenda for sustainable development.
He said the country would give full scope to the centre’s functions as an international think tank, cooperation showcase and people-to-people exchange platform to promote the sustainable development of global connectivity.
Addressing the same event, China merchants group chairman Miao Jianmin said variables such as macroeconomics, geopolitics, the Covid-19 pandemic and supply chain restructuring have greatly increased the difficulty of controlling the shipping market’s current operating rhythm.
It is crucial to promote the upstream and downstream of transport, trade, ports and other industry chains to give full play to their respective advantages and carry out longterm, stable and effective cooperation to jointly build an “open, inclusive, cooperative and win-win” shipping ecosystem, Miao said.
He also suggested that stakeholders make full use of digital applications and promote green shipping to look for new opportunities in the process of restructuring the global supply chain.
On top of geopolitical tensions and unpredictable markets, decarbonisation is also a “grand challenge” that compounds the maritime industry’s transformation path, which requires collaboration across the value chain to find solutions, said Knut Orbeck-nilssen, chief executive officer of DNV Maritime – a Norway-headquartered classification society and adviser to the shipping industry.
Decarbonisation, the process of reducing carbon emissions, is defining not only the industry’s regulatory agenda but also the environmental, social and governance revolution, he said.
“China cannot develop itself in isolation from the rest of the world while the world also needs China for its prosperity.” Dai Dongchang