After the outbreak of the pandemic last year, China, like many other countries, suffered from a shortage of containers causing major disruptions in the trade. However, it is now that the major ports have started to show improvement with the numbers of container volumes increasing.
As per Container xChange, the company’s Container Availability Index (CAx) across China’s main ports rose by 56% compared to before the Chinese New Year.
For Shanghai, CAx rose by 64% and 112%, respectively for 20-foot and 40-foot containers from before Chinese New Year to after the holiday.
Between the Chinese ports of Shanghai, Qingdao, Dalian, and Ningbo, Dalian showed the highest availability of containers; its CAx reading after Chinese New Year reached 0.79 for 20-foot boxes and 0.80 for 40-foot. Dalian was the only port of the four to enter 2021 with CAx above 0.5 for both 20- and 40-foot containers, availability at Dalian has improved this year, but less than in the other ports.
A CAx reading below 0.5 means more containers leaving a port than entering it, while a reading above 0.5 means more containers entering than leaving.
The overall export container volume in the nation has also shown an increase of 13.8% while the domestic volume increased by 16.7% in early March. Among which, the port of Shanghai and Shenzhen posted a growth rate of over 20% for export containers.
As per reports, the cargo throughput at major coastal hub ports increased 10.4% year-on-year while the international trade cargo throughput increased 12.2%.
Crude oil shipments at major coastal ports increased 17% year-on-year while the port inventory declined 12%.
Metal ore shipments at major Chinese ports increased 27.8% year-on-year, among which the port of Ningbo-Zhoushan, Tianjin and Rizhao posted over 30% growth rate. Port inventory increased 3.2%.
Cargo throughput and container volume at the three major Yangtze river ports, Nanjing, Wuhan and Chongqing, increased 44% and 31.4% year-on-year respectively. The export cargo transportation demands from the region was recovering and posted a growth rate of 16.6%.
