China’s Investment in 129 Ports: Global promotion of peace through investment
Dr. Syed Mehboob
Senior Business and Political Analyst
China is the world leader in trade and investment, and it believes in win win situation, partnership, resource sharing, a multipolar world, and non-interference, tolerance, and global brotherhood. It is the largest trade partner with 140 countries, the largest exporter in the world, and the second largest importer, the largest economy in terms of purchasing power parity, second largest economy of the world in nominal terms.
A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Ports are essential pillars of the global economy, serving as critical logistics hubs that handle over 90% of international trade. They facilitate the movements of goods, connecting manufacturers to international markets through shipping, rail, and road networks. Ports drive national economic growth, generate employment, and support regional development.
Over the past two decades, China has gained a foothold in ports across the world, expanding its control and influence over critical shipping routes and vital resource hubs.
Till 2024, China had invested in at least 129 ports spanning nearly the entire continent except Antarctica. China is now considered a Global Port Power. China’s 95 % international trade moves by sea, making access to reliable maritime infrastructure a strategic imperative for Beijing's trade relations with other countries. It is interesting to note that China is the largest trade partner with 140 countries. Its influence over global ports is driven not only by commercial ambition but also by a desire to secure critical supply chains and reduce its dependence on vulnerable maritime chokepoints such as the Straits of Malacca and Suez Canal. Control of overseas ports helps ensure a stable flow of essential imports, from food and energy to critical minerals.
China encouraged both State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) and the private sector to invest abroad, particularly in resource-rich developing countries, to create a win-win situation for both China and developing countries.
In the early 2010s, China doubled down on expanding its economic projects with the launch of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a sweeping plan to build land and maritime infrastructure across Eurasia, Africa, and Latin America. Backed by substantial state support, Chinese firms rapidly scaled up the financing and construction of ports around the world. Between 2013 and 2017 alone, Chinese companies were involved in developing at least fifty- two ports projects.
Africa is the leading destination for Chinese port investment, with Chinese firms now involved in seventy-eight ports around a third of the continent’s total. Much of the investment has poured into West Africa, where there are vast reserves of oil and critical minerals.
Chinese port activity has also been prominent in Latin America. The completion of the Port of Chancay in 2024 in Peru, home to some of the world’s largest copper and zinc reserves. Now, as the third largest port in Latin America and the Caribbean ( after Santos, Brazil, and Manzanillo along Mexico’s western coast), Chancay can reduce shipping times between China and South America by twenty days, while allowing South American exporters to by US and Mexican ports when trading with Asia. China is now South America’s top trade partner, with its exports to the region growing exponentially over the past two decades, rising more than twenty-two-fold, from US$ 12.7 billion in 2002 to US$ 303.7 billion in 2022. These exports are primarily higher-value manufactured goods, including cars, cell phones, and computers.
Chinese visionary leader President Xi Jinping launched the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013 and introduced the Twenty-First Century Maritime Silk Road, which connects China to Europe and the Arctic Ocean via the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean, and has supercharged China’s overseas port investment and construction activities. President Xi has personally emphasized the importance of ports for economic development. When visiting Tieshan Port in Guangxi Province in April 2017, Xi highlighted the importance of ports in economic development, and he said,” We often say that to get rich we must first build roads; but in coastal areas, to get rich we must also first build ports.”
As of 2024, China has signed shipping agreements with sixty-six countries. China’s shipping routes and services network cover major countries and regions worldwide. Shanghai has been the world’s busiest container port for fourteen consecutive years, and several of China’s container ports rank among the most connected in the world.
On his way to the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro in November, Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Peruvian President Dina Boluarte to officially open a new US$ 3.6 billion deep-water mega port in Peru called Chancy. China’s state-owned Cosco shipping giant had purchased a sixty percent stake in the port for US$ 1.6 billion, which gave the company exclusive use of the port for sixty years.
Chancay is part of China’s vision of a 21st-century maritime Silk Road that will better connect China’s manufacturing hubs with its trading partners around the world. This has involved a heavy investment in ports in many countries, which has the West concerned about China’s expanding influence over global shipping routes.
China’s emergence as a maritime and shipping power is central to Xi’s ambition for global economic dominance. For one, China requires stable access to key trading routes to continue meeting the demand for Chinese exports globally, as well as the imports Beijing needs to keep its economy humming. Controlling ports also enables China to create economic zones in other countries that give port owners and operators privileged access to commodities and products.
In a nutshell, China is the world’s undisputed port superpower, handling 30% of global container traffic and hosting 7 of the top 10 busiest container ports. China owns the world’s largest ship fleet by tonnage. Ningbo Zhoushan Port ranks as the world’s busiest by cargo tonnage, while Shanghai holds the top spot for container throughput.
|