Shenzhen port chiefs bid to lure container shipping lines from Hong Kong

Port authorities in Shenzhen are working aggressively to persuade foreign carriers to skip Hong Kong as a transit hub and do business directly with them, the has learned.

Shenzhen is well-placed to overtake Hong Kong as the world's third busiest container port this year. The city could replace Hong Kong as the region's primary transshipment hub for goods, port operators warned.

Last year about 60 per cent of Hong Kong's container throughput came from transshipments. Half of it was due to regulation on the mainland that bans foreign shipping companies from directly sending cargo from one mainland port to another. This regulation is designed to protect the monopoly of domestic shipping lines on the near-sea trade.

However, a document seen by the showed that a Shenzhen customs office has been advising an international shipping line how to use a paperwork loophole to skip Hong Kong and go directly to Shenzhen. It said the foreign shippers could simply name Hong Kong as the port of origin in the manifest they submit to Shenzhen customs without actually loading any goods there.

The found that at least two Shenzhen ports and two major international carriers have diverted hundreds of thousands of boxes a month away from Kwai Chung Container Terminals.

One port operator in Shenzhen, requesting anonymity, said other ports and shipping lines feared they might lose out if they did not adopt the same practice.