The “SISI International Port & Shipping Development Forum (2016) - Innovative Development of Ports and Shipping in the New Economic Normal” sponsored by Shanghai Maritime University and undertaken by Shanghai International Shipping Institute was convened at the Ocean Hotel of Shanghai on Dec 14, 2016. Nearly 300 guests from more than 200 units attended the forum, including Zhou Hanmin, member of the standing committee of the national committee of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), vice-chairman of the central committee of China Democratic National Construction Association, and vice-chairman of Shanghai municipal committee of CPPCC, Xu Zuyuan, former vice-minister of Ministry of Transport of China, member of the national committee of CPPCC and maritime ambassador of International Maritime Organization (IMO), Jin Yongxing, secretary of the Party committee of Shanghai Maritime University, Huang Youfang, president of Shanghai Maritime University, and Yan Wei, vice-president of Shanghai Maritime University. Attendees also included port authorities of various places including Shanghai, Ningbo, Guangzhou, Hainan, Yantai, and Nanjing, universities and research institutes including China Academy of Transportation Sciences, Shanghai Maritime University, Shanghai Institute of Foreign Trade, Ningbo University, Jimei University, and Hohai University, port enterprises including Shanghai Port, Ningbo-Zhoushan Port, Guangzhou Port, Wuhan Port, Zhanjiang Port, Beibuwan Port, Yantai Port, and Nanjing Port, shipping enterprises including China COSCO Shipping Group, Maersk Line China, COSCO Container Lines Co Ltd, COSCO Shipping Oil Transportation Company, Jin Jiang Shipping, and Tianjin Guodian Shipping, organizations including Shanghai Combined Port Management Committee, China Shipowners Mutual Assurance Association, Shanghai Shipowners’ Association, Fujian Shipowners’ Association, Shanghai Shipping Exchange, Xiamen Shipping Exchange, Shanghai branch of China Classification Society, and China Maritime Arbitration Commission, as well as Korea Maritime Institute (KMI), Institute of Shipping Economics and Logistics (ISL) in Bremen, Germany, SRM(Intesa Sanpaolo Banking Group), and Shanghai Branch of China Construction Bank.

Yu Shicheng, director of Shanghai International Shipping Institute, chaired the meeting. Jin Yongxing, secretary of the Party committee of Shanghai Maritime University, delivered a welcoming speech. Jin extended warm welcome and heartfelt gratitude to all the participating leaders and guests. He hoped the numerous participating parties from home and abroad can leverage this opportunity to integrate the powers of innovative elements, take the pulse of port and shipping innovation, and explore port and shipping innovation focuses so as to drive the innovative development of ports and shipping. At last, he expressed congratulations for the opening of the forum.

In the keynote speech section, Xu Zuyuan, former vice-minister of Ministry of Transport of China, member of the national committee of CPPCC and maritime ambassador of International Maritime Organization (IMO), delivered a keynote speech titled “Port Supply-side Structural Reform”. Xu pointed out that China’s port supply-side structural reform has become imperative with no other choices available. He proposed to speed up the integration of port resources to promote the coordinated and balanced development of industrial resources, and speed up the port industry transformation into the “comprehensive logistics service providers” era.

Prof. Zhou Hanmin, member of the standing committee of the national committee of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), vice-chairman of the central committee of China Democratic National Construction Association, and vice-chairman of Shanghai municipal committee of CPPCC, delivered a keynote speech titled “Five Major Environments for International Shipping Development”. He proposed that China’s port and shipping industries should follow the four major national strategies of free trade zone, Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei integration, Yangtze River Economic Belt and “One Belt and One Road” initiatives, and pay attention to five major environments, namely the political, economic, cultural, social and legal environments faced by the development of international shipping industry. On the basis, the industry should embrace a higher opening degree to force a more in-depth reform.

Huang Youfang, president of Shanghai Maritime University, delivered a keynote speech titled “On Supply-side Structural Reform of Shipping Industry from the Supply Chain Perspective”. Huang proposed to lay emphasis on the information flow, logistic flow, capital flow and talent flow to increase consumer satisfaction in accordance with the spirit of the 18th National Congress and the 3rd plenary session of 18th CPC Central Committee. He held that the supply chain structure of the shipping industry should be constantly optimized to bring the resource allocation capability back to the rational level. At the same time, the investment decision-making and enterprise management should be made more scientific and market-oriented to improve the decisive role of the market in resource allocation.

Zhang Ye, president of Shanghai Shipping Exchange, delivered a speech titled “Make Up for Short Slabs in China’s Shipping”. Zhang proposed that at present, China’s shipping industry is faced with five short slabs, namely the law, mechanism, property rights, data and globalization. He also pointed out that the short-board problems of the shipping industry can be solved using the all-benefiting concept, intelligentization and humanistic concern.

Prof. Yan Wei, vice-president of Shanghai Maritime University, chaired the meeting in the afternoon.

To actively promote the research and development of the new business model of “Internet + Ship Service”, Shanghai International Shipping Institute worked with Fangzhou Group to set up a “Ship 6S Service Research Institute”. In order to promote the transformation and upgrading of shipping enterprises and the innovation of industrial service models, Fangzhou Group set up the “Shipping Incubator Research Center” in Hongkou District, and the inauguration ceremony for the two research institutes were held during the forum.

Shanghai International Shipping Institute (SISI) has long been committed to AIS big data mining to provide strong support for the port and shipping market analysis. During the forum, some port and shipping market analysis products based on AIS big data were also released, including the rankings of Chinese major coastal container ports in terms of comprehensive services in 2016, rankings of domestic dry bulk cargo shipping ships in terms of operation efficiency in 2016 and dynamic monitoring and analysis on global Capesize carriers based on AIS system.

Xu Zhonghua, vice president of Shanghai Branch of China Construction Bank, delivered a keynote speech titled “Innovation of Shipping Financial Models throughout the Industrial Chain under New Circumstances”. Based on the current shipping finance development environment, Xu put forward the innovation of shipping financial models from six aspects: modular financing portfolio schemes, crossover financial portfolio schemes, as well as the launch of global comprehensive credit granting, global cash management, package deals of credit and finance lease and comprehensive financial services of logistics for land.

Ma Shuo, vice-president of World Maritime University and director of Expert Committee of Shanghai International Shipping Institute, delivered a keynote speech titled “New Challenges from Demand Side”. Ma said that the changes in trade policies have a middle- or short-term impact on shipping and the impact is reversible. In addition, the impact mainly occurs to liner shipping in advanced industrialized countries, while the effects of industrial structure changes on shipping are of a long term and irreversible, with a greater impact on liner shipping. Therefore, he encouraged more attention to structural changes.

Zhang Lin, director of Wuhan Newport Management Board, delivered a keynote speech titled “Thoughts on Innovative Development of Shipping in Yangtze River - Practices Based on Wuhan Shipping Center Construction”. Zhang proposed to build Wuhan Shipping Center into the core hub of the Yangtze River Golden Waterway, an intermodal center with sea-river-through transportation, innovative shipping service center and the international logistics distribution center through the “1 +2511” project.

Tong Mengda, chief economist of Ningbo Zhoushan Port Group Co Ltd, delivered a keynote speech titled “Bewilderment in Taking New Paths in Old Shoes - Thoughts on Innovation of Business Models of Port and Shipping Enterprises”. Tong proposed that port enterprises should change themselves, innovate business models and take on new shoes for the new path from nine aspects, namely the development idea, industrial chain, service chain, operation role, service function, cooperation object, port hinterland, transportation mode and business areas.

Shi Yingtong, general manager on policy and legal affairs of Maersk Line in China, delivered a keynote speech titled “Supply-side Reform and Cost Conservation of Liner Shipping Industry”. Targeting the overcapacity problem in the liner shipping industry, Shi proposed that shipping enterprises should take actions to control the shipping capacity, promote value-oriented freights, reduce costs of enterprises and make full use of digital and e-commerce advantages to develop new products for customers.

Olaf Merk, port and shipping administrator of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), delivered a keynote speech titled “How shipping could make globalisation more desirable”. In view of the current problems in globalization, Olaf listed the risks brought by anti-globalization to shipping. In view of the problems of the shipping industry such as carbon emissions and port congestion, he advised to enhance globalization to reinvigorate the shipping industry.

Sung-Woo Lee, Director General of Port & Logistics Research Division of Korea Maritime Institute (KMI), delivered a keynote speech titled “Outlook on Northeast Asian Ports and Maritime Logistics in the Geographical Backdrop”. Lee analyzed the future development trend of the Northeast Asian ports and maritime logistics in the geographical context, mainly from the shipping route layout changes, the Arctic route upgrades and the development of new canals, presenting us with a new shipping route map of the future.

Burkhard Lemper, managing director of Institute of Shipping Economics and Logistics (ISL) in Bremen, Germany, delivered a keynote speech titled “Mega-Container-Ships Economics of Container Ship Size development and its limiting factors”. He suggested improving the handling capacity of container terminals and hinterland infrastructure to achieve the scale economy goal of mega container ships.

Alessandro Panaro, Head of Maritime & Mediterranean Department under SRM (Intesa Sanpaolo banking group) of Italy, delivered a keynote speech titled “The challenges of the Mediterranean: economic scenario and forecasts”. He analyzed the impact of the Suez Canal and the Panama Canal expansions, and described the importance of Chinese shipping in the Mediterranean, Europe and the Gulf regions in the light of the One Belt, One Road initiative put forward by the Chinese government.

Xu Ping, deputy chief engineer of China Academy of Transportation Sciences, delivered a keynote speech titled “Thoughts on Market Supervision System Construction”. Xu said that in a market-oriented economy, the fundamental role of the market in allocating resources should be exerted to maximize social welfare. The government must perform the supervision according to law, and play the roles of industry associations and other non-governmental organizations.

Gao Fang, CEO of Fangzhou Group, delivered a keynote speech titled “New Shipping and New Operation Model - On Shipping Service Model Innovation”. He explained the development concept of Ship 6S Service System which takes the integration of supply chain management and procurement model as the grasp and reduction of clients’ supply chain procurement costs as the aim.

Zhen Hong, secretary-general of Shanghai International Shipping Institute, delivered a keynote speech titled “Thoughts on China’s Shipping Development Strategies in the 3rd Industrial Revolution”. Zhen suggested that Chinese shipping enterprises should become the integrator of logistics value chain as soon as possible, and provide customized logistics supply chain services matching the large-scale custom manufacturing. They should strengthen the inter-continental route transportation and pay more attention to the shipping demands within the continent (region). He also suggested projecting manpower, capital and other resources to the end of the logistics chain to create a “community-oriented” targeted service in the cargo source places.

The experts, business executives and government officials attending the meeting from all over the world discussed the strategic transformation, model innovation, supply-side reform and new business pattern cultivation of port and shipping industries centering around the topics of port and shipping innovative development under the new economic normal. They conducted extensive exchanges and in-depth discussions in a hope to make new breakthroughs in innovation models for new developments in the port and shipping industries. The seminar was concluded in warm applauses successfully.