Chen Liangxian, Deputy Governor of Guangdong Provincial Government, Lu Yaxing, Deputy Director of Provincial Department of Transportation, Wang Ruijun, Secretary of Shaoguan Municipal Party Committee, Chen Shaorong, Deputy Secretary of Shaoguan Municipal Party Committee and Mayor, Huang Zhenhai, General Manager of Guangdong Energy Group, Li Yibo, Secretary of the Party Committee and Board Chairman of Guangzhou Port Group and Board Chairman of Guangzhou Port Co., Ltd., and Wei Tongjun, Deputy General Manager of Guangzhou Port Co., Ltd., attended the event.

 

According to Wang Ruijun, Shaoguan is a node city of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area connecting to the inland areas, ranking first in term of the total length of rivers and the number of navigable rivers in the ecological development zone in the northern part of Guangdong, and it has obvious advantages in the development of water transport and inland ports and shipping. In recent years, Shaoguan Municipal Party Committee and Government have successfully implemented the Beijiang River Channel Expansion and Upgrade Project, so that 1,000-DWT ships can directly get to Hong Kong and Macao from Shaoguan City to the Pearl River Delta through the Beijiang River Channel, and the scale and time of navigation are greatly shortened. The Baitu Operation Zone Project initiated by Guangzhou Port Group and Shaoguan City will further complement the shortcomings of Shaoguan waterway transportation, optimize regional water transportation logistics paths, and build an economic, efficient, green, smart and safe modern port and shipping system.

 

According to Li Yibo, the development of Shaoguan Port will further optimize logistics paths, reduce logistics costs, attract industry clusters, promote Shaoguan’s accelerated integration into the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and better serve the new development pattern of “domestic and international cycles”. Guangzhou Port will continue to take its professional advantages as a world-class port, build quality projects, strengthen the connection between Guangzhou Port and Shaoguan Port, and give play to the leading and basic role of the ports to serve the regional economic development. At the same time, Guangzhou Port will make use of its experience in water tourism management to successfully operate the Shaoguan water tourism cooperation project and help Shaoguan become the first choice for regional tourism, leisure and vacation.

 

A few days ago, Guangdong Ganghang Investment Co., Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Guangzhou Port, and Shaoguan Ganghang Development Co., Ltd. jointly established Shaoguan Beijiang River International Terminal Co., Ltd. to invest in the construction and operation of the public cargo terminal in Beijiang River Port Area of Shaoguan Port. Guangdong Ganghang holds 65% of the shares.

 

The Phase I Project of the Baitu Operation Zone in Beijiang River Port Area of Shaoguan Port is located between the Beijiang River Mengli Hub and the Mengzhouba Hub, on the right bank of the mainstream of the Beijiang River, 200 meters downstream the Beijiang Bridge on the Leguang Expressway, and backed by the Baitu Industrial Park in Qujiang District. It is planned to build eight 1,000-DWT multi-purpose berths, with a total length of 615 meters, and container yards, general cargo yards, port joint inspection facilities and auxiliary buildings will be constructed accordingly. The designed annual throughput of the terminal is 200,000 TEUs for containers and 1.2 million DWT for general cargo. The total investment of the project is estimated at about RMB 699 million, and the construction period of the project is from 2021 to 2023 according to the plan. (Text by Zou Jingqi and Wang Shenghua, Picture by Zhu Junkun)