Shanghai remained the world’s busiest container port for the 13th year in a row, despite a stringent period of hard lockdown during 2022.
Chinese officials have released preliminary figures which reveal Shanghai’s overall container volume remained stable for the year, indicating a significant recovery after April 2022 when lockdowns in the city and restrictions on the movement of trucks and cargo temporarily constrained volumes.
China’s state-run news agency Xinhua reported that the port's container throughput had exceeded 47.3 million TEUs in 2022, according to Shanghai International Port (Group), the port operator. This represented an increase of less than 1% compared to the 47.0m TEUs handled in 2021, when volumes increased just over 8% compared to 2020.
“Following the epidemic in the second quarter, the port managed to quickly make a V-shaped recovery in container throughput in July, when it handled a monthly record high of 4.3m TEUs,” Xinhua reported.
According to Maritime Executive, Shanghai started 2022 strong, with a record 4.35m TEUs as exporters and carriers rushed to move containers before the start of the Chinese New Year holiday. Volumes remained strong in the first quarter, but in April the port was hit by the start of an extended lockdown in Shanghai and surrounding areas due to the country’s zero-Covid policy.
Port officials reported at the time that they were maintaining operations during the lockdowns by isolating workers within the port. However, factories were shut and cargo movements were restricted, impacting truckers. Cargo volumes dropped to the lowest level of the year in April, reaching over 3m TEUs and just over 10m TEUs for the quarter.
However, volumes recovered strongly in the third quarter of 2022, when the port rebounded to handle more than 12m TEUs. Volumes of above 4.1m TEUs per month were reported in October and November but this dropped to an estimated 3.8m in December.
Meanwhile, cargo volumes at port facilities at Ningbo-Zhoushan also reflected strong growth in 2022. Port officials reported that the facilities had handled more than 31m TEUs, with growth of nearly 8% for 2022. Qingdao demonstrated growth of almost 8% to over 23m TEUs in the first 11 months of the year. Overall, Chinese ports handled more than 210m TEUs during the first 11 months of 2022, representing an increase of more than 4% in container volume.
