Logistics focus sees Baoshan cruising to greater achievements

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AS Shanghai's important port and steel area, Baoshan District has strived to ensure that it meets changing challenges. Innovations include creating a cutting-edge logistics sector, serving everything from heavy industry to cruise ships. Qu Zhi takes a voyage of discovery.

As Shanghai's northern gate on the banks of the Yangtze River, Baoshan District boasts the biggest port in the delta region, the Wusongkou International Cruise Ship Terminal.

In addition to the glamor of cruise liners, the district is also home to several other ports, including Wusong Port, Baoshan Port and Zhanghuabang Port and has an excellent transport infrastructure.

For years, Baoshan has been Shanghai's most vital port and steel center, thanks to its location and industry base created by Shanghai Baosteel Group. In 2011, Baosteel's crude steel production reached 43.3 million tonnes - the fourth-highest output in the world.

Integral to this success are services provided by the logistics sector.

In 2011, logistics enterprises within a certain scale in the district totaled more than 1,020, with operating income up to 10 million yuan (US$1.6 million).

Baoshan's logistics sector has 101 large warehouses and some 14,000 trailers, and employs 1.8 million people. In 2011, sales income totaled 11.75 billion yuan.

Last Saturday, the Sino-American Logistics Conference was held in Baoshan, with the aim of building a platform for logistics enterprise cooperation, promoting exchanges in the domestic and international logistics industry and of enhancing influence and competitiveness.

Baoshan District Party Secretary Si Fumin gave a welcome speech, outlining the goals of further development in the industry. In recent years, Baoshan has seen the transformation of a traditional logistics sector into a modern industry. A large number of old warehouses, yards and factories have been reinvented as cutting-edge facilities.

In Baoshan, the value total in the logistics sector increased from 51.6 percent in 2005 to 55.7 percent in 2011, ranking the first among suburban areas in Shanghai.

An example of this upward trend can be seen in Yanghang Town. While in the past it used to lag behind in the sector, it has now become the Shanghai Steel Logistics Business Zone. This integrates business flow, logistics, information flow and capital flow in one entity, and has been listed among the top 20 modern service industries in Shanghai.

Restructuring has also seen the establishment of the Shanghai Steel Trading Center, the Shanghai Bulk Stock Information Center, the Shanghai International Cruise Distribution Center, the Shanghai International Wine Trading Center and the Shanghai Timber Trading Center.

Among the most high-profile developments wharfside was the redevelopment of a cargo port into the Wusong International Cruise Ship Terminal. It is estimated that by 2013 the terminal will see more than 1,500 cruise ship dockings each year.

And attracting cruise ships has also created booming demand for subsidiary services in the district.

In the steel sector, Baoshan is building a modern service industry that boasts the resource allocation functions in both international and domestic markets. It is believed that this can help take the district's logistics sector to a new level.

"Baoshan is ideally positioned to retain a foothold in Shanghai while radiating through the whole of Yangtze River Delta Region providing national service, facing the world," said a government official.

Through six functions - steel information, steel trading, logistics and distribution, financial services, design and development and recycling - the district is creating a service system meeting the steel industry's needs, whether private or state-owned enterprises.

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