The Port of Ningbo-Zhoushan is the busiest port in the world in terms of cargo tonnage. It handled 888.96 million tons of cargo in 2015. The port is located in

Ningbo Ningbo is a sub-provincial city in northeastern Zhejiang province, People's Republic of China. It comprises six urban districts, two satellite county-level cities, and two rural counties, including several islands in Hangzhou Bay and the Eas ...

and

Zhoushan Zhoushan is an urbanized archipelago with the administrative status of a prefecture-level city in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang. It consists of an archipelago of islands at the southern mouth of Hangzhou Bay off the mainland c ...

, on the coast of the

East China Sea The East China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean, located directly offshore from East China. China names the body of water along its eastern coast as "East Sea" (, ) due to direction, the name of "East China Sea" is otherwise ...

, in

Zhejiang ) , translit_lang1_type2 = , translit_lang1_info2 = ( Hangzhounese) ( Ningbonese) (Wenzhounese) , image_skyline = 玉甑峰全貌 - panoramio.jpg , image_caption = View of the Yandang Mountains , image_map = Zhejiang i ...

province on the southeast end of Hangzhou Bay, across which it faces the municipality of

Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...

. The port is at the crossroads of the north–south inland and coastal shipping route, including canals to the important inland waterway to interior China, the

Yangtze River The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ) is the longest river in Eurasia and the third-longest in the world. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains of the Tibetan Plateau and flows including Dam Qu River the longest source of the Yangtze, i ...

, to the north. The port consists of several ports which are Beilun (seaport), Zhenhai (estuary port), and old Ningbo harbor (inland river port). The operator of the port, Ningbo Zhoushan Port Co., Ltd. (NZP), is a listed company, but it is 76.31% owned by state-owned Ningbo Zhoushan Port Group Co., Ltd., .

History

Ningbo Port was established in 1738. During the

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, c=唐朝), or the Tang Empire, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907, with an Wu Zhou, interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed ...

(618–907), it was known as one of the three major seaports for foreign trade under the name "Mingzhou", along with

Yangzhou Yangzhou is a prefecture-level city in central Jiangsu Province, East China. Sitting on the north bank of the Yangtze, it borders the provincial capital Nanjing to the southwest, Huai'an to the north, Yancheng to the northeast, Taizhou, Jiangsu, ...

and

Guangzhou Guangzhou, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Canton or Kwangchow, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Guangdong Provinces of China, province in South China, southern China. Located on the Pearl River about nor ...

. In the

Song dynasty The Song dynasty ( ) was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 960 to 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song, who usurped the throne of the Later Zhou dynasty and went on to conquer the rest of the Fiv ...

, it became one of the three major port cities for foreign trade, together with Guangzhou and

Quanzhou Quanzhou is a prefecture-level city, prefecture-level port city on the north bank of the Jin River, beside the Taiwan Strait in southern Fujian, China, People's Republic of China. It is Fujian's largest most populous metropolitan region, wi ...

. It was designated as one of the " Five Treaty Ports" along with

Xiamen Xiamen,), also known as Amoy ( ; from the Zhangzhou Hokkien pronunciation, zh, c=, s=, t=, p=, poj=Ē͘-mûi, historically romanized as Amoy, is a sub-provincial city in southeastern Fujian, People's Republic of China, beside the Taiwan Stra ...

Fuzhou Fuzhou is the capital of Fujian, China. The city lies between the Min River (Fujian), Min River estuary to the south and the city of Ningde to the north. Together, Fuzhou and Ningde make up the Eastern Min, Mindong linguistic and cultural regi ...

and

after the 1842

Treaty of Nanking The Treaty of Nanking was the peace treaty which ended the First Opium War (1839–1842) between United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Great Britain and the Qing dynasty of China on 29 August 1842. It was the first of what the Chinese ...

that ended the

First Opium War The First Opium War ( zh, t=第一次鴉片戰爭, p=Dìyīcì yāpiàn zhànzhēng), also known as the Anglo-Chinese War, was a series of military engagements fought between the British Empire and the Chinese Qing dynasty between 1839 and 1 ...

. In 2006, the Port of Ningbo was merged with the neighboring Port of Zhoushan to form a combined cargo handling center. The combined Ningbo-Zhoushan Port handled a total cargo volume of 744,000,000 metric tons of cargo in 2012, making it the largest port in the world in terms of cargo tonnage, surpassing the Port of Shanghai for the first time. The port is part of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road that runs from the Chinese coast to

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

, towards the southern tip of

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Mombasa Mombasa ( ; ) is a coastal city in southeastern Kenya along the Indian Ocean. It was the first capital of British East Africa, before Nairobi was elevated to capital status in 1907. It now serves as the capital of Mombasa County. The town is ...

, from there through the Red Sea via the

Suez Canal The Suez Canal (; , ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, Indo-Mediterranean, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia (and by extension, the Sinai Peninsula from the rest ...

to the Mediterranean, there to the Upper Adriatic region to the northern Italian hub of

Trieste Trieste ( , ; ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital and largest city of the Regions of Italy#Autonomous regions with special statute, autonomous region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia, as well as of the Province of Trieste, ...

with its connections to

Central Europe Central Europe is a geographical region of Europe between Eastern Europe, Eastern, Southern Europe, Southern, Western Europe, Western and Northern Europe, Northern Europe. Central Europe is known for its cultural diversity; however, countries in ...

and the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...

Economic trade

The Port of Ningbo-Zhoushan is involved in economic trade with cargo shipment, raw materials and manufactured goods from as far as North and South America and Oceania. It has economic trade with over 560 ports from more than 90 countries and regions in the world. It is one of a growing number of ports in China with a cargo throughput volume exceeding 100 million tons annually. The water quality within Ningbo-Zhoushan Port has become badly polluted over the past ten years, due to the massive scale of maritime traffic constantly in operation.http://www.nbwh.gov.cn/homepage/specialty/civc/english_add_1.phpid=1126590263&theme=546&uptheme=true

Port infrastructure

The Port of Ningbo-Zhoushan complex is a modern multi-purpose deep water port, consisting of inland,

estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime enviro ...

, and coastal harbors. There are a total of 191 berths including 39 deep water berths with 10,000 and more tonnage. The larger ports include a 250,000 tonnage crude oil terminal and a 200,000+ tonnage ore loading berth. There is also a purpose-built terminal for 6th generation container vessels and a 50,000 tonnage berth dedicated for liquid chemical products. In August 2020, the Ningbo-Zhoushan Port (NZP) Group, together with Brazilian iron ore miner

Vale A vale is a type of valley. Vale may also refer to: Places Georgia * Vale, Georgia, a town in the Samtskhe-Javakheti region Norway * Våle, a historic municipality Portugal * Vale (Santa Maria da Feira), a former civil parish in the municip ...

, inaugurated the Shulanghu ( zh, labels=no, s=鼠浪湖码头) grinding hub, after a collaboration that began in 2016. This was followed in November 2020 by an () investment deal. The Zhejiang Free Trade Zone was quoted as stating that an "iron ore storage yard, with a maximum capacity of 4.1 million tonnes, an ore blending and processing facility and two shipping berths" would be built.

References

External links

* {{Transport in China Ningbo-Zhoushan Ningbo-Zhoushan Ningbo-Zhoushan Transport in Ningbo Buildings and structures in Zhejiang