Fu Yuning, president of China Merchants Group, said that statistics from the Ministry of Transport show China’s major ports handled 121 million TEUs of containers in 2009, down 6% year on year. The figure has rebounded since second half of 2009 as a result of global economic recovery.
Fu Yuning believes container throughput may rise to 125 million TEUs this year, 3% higher than last year.
CargoNews Asia reports, however, CITIC Securities stated in a report that despite the increase, China’s port industry is unlikely to return to the prosperity of 2001 to 2007 given the long term trend of slowing growth in China’s foreign trade.