Since China entered WTO, it has been one of the major markets of the world by continuing the open-economy policy and attracting foreign investments. Especially during the last several years, the rapid growth of GDP and the international trade contributed to the growth of marine cargo and container throughput.
Shantou Port as an important gate to the South of China is located in Pearl-River Delta of the Southern Bay. The Pearl-River economic bloc is the biggest industrial production center in the South of China. In 1984 China government announced that China would support the construction of international shipping and logistics center for a set of selected fourteen ports. Shantou is one of those fourteen ports. This paper suggests the developing strategy of Shantou Port as a Hub Port in the South of China.
Firstly. this paper focuses on the Free Trade Zone of some well known ports of the World and suggests some business strategy implications for Shantou.
Secondly, this paper presents the current state of Shantou port as it is comparing with other neighboring ports. This paper also analyzes the development of hinterland economy, the inland transportation system, the shipping market environment, and several insufficiencies of Shantou port. All these lead to the conclusion that Shantou port has a real potential of becoming a Hub-port in South China. Shantou still has many problems such as poor industrial infrastructure, lack of main loading and unloading machines, lack of hinterland economy zone as well as low service level.
Finally, this paper suggests some development strategy for Shantou port as an international Hub-Port for the South of China Shantou should be equipped with a better developed port hinterland, and a wider inland transportation system, and a better organized Free Trade Zone, In addition to these, Shantou should improve its own port service level, and operational efficiency together with the better command of foreign languages.