Economy and Business

French port seeks business in China

By Chen Qide (China Daily Shanghai Bureau)
Updated: 2009-12-01 17:30

The French Port of Le Havre is seeking business opportunities in China, hoping to co-operate with Chinese shipping companies.

A delegation led by Christian Leroux, chairman of Port Users Association, is touring Shanghai and Ningbo in Zhejiang province for the next few days for talks with Chinese shipping companies such as COSCO and China Shipping.

Leroux said today that the port wants to stimulate its further development by attracting more Chinese ships.

"Le Havre has maintained a stable growth, but needs more co-operation with shipping companies from China, which has been considered a very important market to us," said Leroux.

As the largest container port in France, Le Havre handles 75 per cent of Sino-French imports and exports.

It handled 5.4 million tons of cargo to and from China in 2008, a drastic growth from 4 million tons in 2006.

"The port expects to handle the same trade volume with China this year even under the global financial crisis," he said.

Herve Cornede, commercial director of Grand Port Maritime du Havre, said most of the cargo was carried by containers. Last year it handled 600,000 twenty-feet equivalent units (TEU) of containers to and from China, far exceeding 200,000 TEU in 2000.

Cornede said Le Havre has weekly 10 regular flights for China's 14 ports by co-operating with 15 shipping companies such as ANL, APL and China Shipping.

"China is our largest market, which has great potential," he said.

His words were echoed by Leroux, who said the China market is very stable, adding that the trade between France and China is increasing compared with the European markets.

Cornede said cargo which is shipped to the Port of Le Havre will be carried to different parts of Europe by expressway, rail and water.

At the moment, container vehicles carry 85 per cent of the cargo, rail at 7.5 per cent and water at 7.5 per cent, he said.

"We are looking into changing the transport models with a plan to transport 60 per cent of cargo by vehicle, 30 per cent by rail and 10 per cent by water within five years," he said.

"Doing so would reduce costs and pollution," he added.

In order to spur its business, the port has invested in a new logistics park of 600,000 square meters, which will be put into service within two years.

By then, the port will have a combined logistics area of 1.6 million square meters for cargo storage, Cornede said.