Port of Guangzhou is the main seaport of

Guangzhou city Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and Chinese postal romanization, alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Guangdong Provinces of China, province in South China, sou ...

Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...

province, China. The port is operated by Guangzhou Port Group Co. Ltd which is a state owned company. The company was established on February 26, 2004 from the former Guangzhou Harbor Bureau. It was approved by the Guangzhou Municipal Government. It is currently the largest comprehensive port in South China. Its international

maritime trade Maritime may refer to: Geography * Maritime Alps, a mountain range in the southwestern part of the Alps * Maritime Region, a region in Togo * Maritime Southeast Asia * The Maritimes, the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Pri ...

reaches over 300 ports in more than 80 countries and districts worldwide.Guangzhou International-the Official Website of Guangzhou Municipality
The port also incorporates the former Huangpu Port. The port also serves as the important economic and transport center for the

Pearl River Delta The Pearl River Delta Metropolitan Region (PRD; ; pt, Delta do Rio das Pérolas (DRP)) is the low-lying area surrounding the Pearl River estuary, where the Pearl River flows into the South China Sea. Referred to as the Guangdong-Hong Kong-M ...

region and Guangdong province. It is also vital transport hub for industries located in neighboring provinces such as Guangxi, Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, Hunan, Hubei and Jiangxi.

History

Guangzhou was an important port during the ancient times as far back as the

Qin Dynasty The Qin dynasty ( ; zh, c=秦朝, p=Qín cháo, w=), or Ch'in dynasty in Wade–Giles romanization ( zh, c=, p=, w=Ch'in ch'ao), was the first dynasty of Imperial China. Named for its heartland in Qin state (modern Gansu and Shaanxi), th ...

. It served as a trading port as the "Silk Road on the Sea". The port became one of China's busiest ports during the

Ming dynasty The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han peop ...

and

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speaki ...

Geography

Guangzhou Port is situated at the intersection of the three most important rivers of

Dongjiang The Dong River is the eastern tributary of the Pearl River in Guangdong province, southern China. The other two main tributaries of Pearl River are Xi River and Bei River. The headwater is located in Mount Sanbai () in Anyuan County, Jiangxi. ...

Xijiang The Xi River (; ) or Si-Kiang is the western tributary of the Pearl River in southern China. It is formed by the confluence of the Gui and Xun Rivers in Wuzhou, Guangxi. It originates from the eastern foot of the Maxiong Mountain in Qujing C ...

and Beijiang in South China. All the three rivers have the waterway, railway, expressway and air lines intersecting here, thus forming a critical transportation hub. It is the main port of focus in the

Region. The port's harbor area extends along the Pearl River coast and water areas in the cities of

Guangzhou Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kong ...

Dongguan Dongguan (; ) is a prefecture-level city in central Guangdong Province, China. An important industrial city in the Pearl River Delta, Dongguan borders the provincial capital of Guangzhou to the north, Huizhou to the northeast, Shenzhen to the so ...

Zhongshan Zhongshan (; ) is a prefecture-level city in the south of the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong province, China. As of the 2020 census, the whole city with 4,418,060 inhabitants is now part of the Guangzhou–Shenzhen conurbation with 65,565,622 i ...

Shenzhen Shenzhen (; ; ; ), also historically known as Sham Chun, is a major sub-provincial city and one of the special economic zones of China. The city is located on the east bank of the Pearl River estuary on the central coast of southern provin ...

and

Zhuhai Zhuhai (, ; Yale: ''Jyūhói''), also known as Chuhai is a prefecture-level city located on the west bank of Pearl River estuary on the central coast of southern Guangdong province, People's Republic of China, on the southeastern edge of Pearl ...

. The port being situated beyond the entrance of Pearl River opening serve as a gateway for shipping activity for other Harbor area such as Nansha Harbor Area, Xinsha Harbor Area, Huangpu Harbor Area and Inner Harbor Area, and Nansha Harbor Area near Hong Kong.

Port infrastructure

Guangzhou Port comprises 4600 berths, 133 buoys and 2359 anchorages each of 1,000 tonnage class and the largest capacity is 3,000 tons. The government has approved of the dredging of the port to allow 100 000 tonnes vessels to enter Nansha at high tide in July 2009. The port is currently dredging to allow 100 000 tonnes vessels to enter Nansha terminal in low tide.

Port activities

The Port of Guangzhou plays a very important role in the economy. The port handles a range of activities which include loading and discharging, storage, bonded warehousing, container cargo services. Many agricultural, industrial and manufactured products are shipped through the port which include oil, coal, grain, chemical fertilizer,　steel, ore and automobiles. The port also provides passenger services as well as logistics services. It also played a major role in contributing to the success of the missionary hospital,

the Canton Hospital The Canton Hospital () or Ophthalmic Hospital in Canton, also known as the Canton Pok Tsai Hospital, was founded by Protestant medical missionary Peter Parker (1804-1888) in Canton, China on November 4, 1835. The hospital treated thousands of pat ...

Shipping

As the biggest comprehensive hub port in South China, Port of Guangzhou is experiencing an increase in cargo volume and ships calling in. This is due to the buoyant economic activity in Guangzhou and the surrounding hinterland. In 1999, Port of Guangzhou surpassed its annual cargo throughput of 100 million tons. It is the second port in

Mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...

to ranked with such record volume. As a result, the annual cargo volume continues to grow. In 2006, the whole Guangzhou Port surpassed 300 million tons (ranking the third in China's coastal ports and the fifth among the world top ten ports) and 665 million TEUs, and Guangzhou Port reached 201 million tons and 4.774 million TEUs. The port is part of the Maritime

Silk Road The Silk Road () was a network of Eurasian trade routes active from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century. Spanning over 6,400 kilometers (4,000 miles), it played a central role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and rel ...

that runs from the Chinese coast to the southern tip of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, to

Mombasa Mombasa ( ; ) is a coastal city in southeastern Kenya along the Indian Ocean. It was the first capital of the British East Africa, before Nairobi was elevated to capital city status. 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 ( arz, قَنَاةُ ٱلسُّوَيْسِ, ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia. The long canal is a popular ...

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

Trieste Trieste ( , ; sl, Trst ; german: Triest ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital city, and largest city, of the autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, one of two autonomous regions which are not subdivided into prov ...

with its rail connections to

Central Europe Central Europe is an area of Europe between Western Europe and Eastern Europe, based on a common historical, social and cultural identity. The Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) between Catholicism and Protestantism significantly shaped the ar ...

and the

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

.Chi Gong, Xianghui Yang, Yujia Liu, Hui Xiong "China's Port-Hinterland Coordinated Economic Development under ‘Maritime Silk Road’ Initiative" In: Journal of Coastal Research (2020) 112 (SI): 465–471.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Port of Guangzhou Shanghai, Port of Transport in Guangzhou