Shanghai handled more containers between April and June, the report said, citing data compiled by port authorities. In the first six months of this year, Singapore moved 14.05 million 20-foot standard containers and Shanghai 13.85 million, it said.

Source : Konaxis

Sha Hailin, Deputy Secretary-General of the Shanghai Municipal Government, Municipal Commission of Commerce, said at the seminar, Shanghai netizens online shopping usage rate, the average spending of online shopping are among the first in the country, close to developed countries.
According to Sha Hailin, Shanghai E-commerce (electronic business channels) transactions increased from 208 billion yuan in 2006 to 325 billion yuan last year, an yearly increase of up to 15.9%, increased by 1.5 times. By the end of last year, the number of netizens in Shanghai reached 11.71 million, the online shopping amount accounted for 5.02% of the city’s social consumer goods sales.

Gu Jiahe, secretary-General of Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce, said Shanghai gathered a large number of successful online shopping businesses, such as Chinese and foreign E-Commerces including Bai Lian e-commerce, Bian Li Tong e-commerce, Yi Bei China, Netease and third party payment business such as Hui Fu Tian Xia, Kuai Qian, and Huan Xun etc. and Chinese top class logistics companies such as Shen Tong Express, Yuan Tong Express, Zhong Cheng Express and Zhong Tong Express. “These companies are the important support and potential for Shanghai online shopping development.?

At present, Shanghai is speeding up transformation of economic growth, accelerating building of international economic, financial, trade and shipping center. Sha Hailin, said: “to develop e-commerce is important to the Shanghai Construction ‘four centers’ in particular the International Trade Center. Shanghai will continue to increase promotion of e-commerce applications and innovative models, from height of the World Trade Center to promote e-business development. “

According to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences published “Business Blue Book” , in 2010 annual online shopping sales will increase to 500 billion yuan close to 3% of year’s total retail sales, while in the retail industry, Internet retailers have maintained much higher steady growth than that of the physical retailers.

The National Development and Reform Commission said in a notice Tuesday that the long-awaited park would be built, as expected, in Shanghai’s eastern Pudong district.

It said the project would initially occupy 116 hectares (287 acres) of land ? a bit more than half the size of the Los Angeles park and potentially the smallest of the Disney theme parks worldwide. Even the Disney park in Hong Kong occupies 126 hectares (311 acres).

Shanghai, China’s biggest city, and Disney have yet to announce final details for the amusement park. But it is likely to open the park in phases, and perhaps expand it later, as has the Disney theme park in Hong Kong, once business is established.

Disney has said the initial phase of the project would include a Magic Kingdom-style park tailored to the Shanghai region, mainland China’s commercial and financial hub. Plans call for it to open in 2014.

Disney has gradually expanded its presence in mainland China after opening a theme park in Hong Kong in 2005 and now has offices in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou.

Shanghai is in the midst of a construction boom ahead of the World Expo, which will open May 1.

Source : Konaxis

Sponsored by the Shanghai Network culture Association, this forum had a theme of “social media and the World Expo Opportunities”, focusing on the basic characteristics of social media, application patterns and trends, and communicated fully surrounding the issues such as using the Expo opportunity and developing the features of social media to carry out network culture constructions.

This forum discussed that to fully understand the social media and the Shanghai World Expo were two great opportunities to promote the city’s network culture development prosperity.

The move is expected to attract more foreign investment to Shanghai, which is hit more hard by the financial crisis than other China cities as its economy is largely dependent on foreign firms. The city posted a year-on-year growth of 5.6 percent in GDP with 661.3 billion yuan in the first half, lower than the national increase of 7.1 percent in the same period.

Foreign investors have set up 16 regional headquarters, five investment companies, and 10 research and development centers this year, taking the total number of international companies in the city to 708.

Shanghai attracted $5.15 billion foreign investment during the first six months of this year, up 2.5 percent year on year.

A local professor cautioned that the policy would probably lead to disorderly competition among different districts to attract international enterprises and make it hard for the local government to manage.

Source : Konaxis

City level guidelines to create a global financial hub will take effect from August 1, including the establishment of a fund to boost the financial industry.

Wu Hong, a local lawmaker and a professor at East China University of Political Science and Law, said detailed implementation rules on Shanghai’s financial development fund will be launched first, but he declined to provide a timetable. The fund is designed to attract top-level talent to the city and spur innovation.

Shanghai received the State Council approval to try innovative approaches on a trial basis to build the city into a major financial and shipping hub by 2020.

Shanghai is already China’s financial hub, home to the Chinese mainland’s larger stock market, its major futures market for metals and energy, its gold bourse and the foreign exchange center.

Source : Konaxis

There are two big stories to watch in the YRD this year and beyond ? the growth and consolidation of Shanghai as an urban centre and logistics and service hub, and the increasing competitiveness of the regional cities.

Shanghai itself is forecast to grow at a rate of 600,000 people, and 100,000 cars a year up to 2010. The structure of the city will change, with some 1m people being moved out to one of the nine new towns being created in the suburbs. New infrastructure is being constructed to handle the increased volume and new patterns of commuter travel. The downside of all this is of course increased costs, and land and labour costs go up.

In terms of moving goods not people, 2006 is a key year ? the first phase of the Yangshan Deep Water Port opens, linked to the city by a new 33km bridge across the sea. Many shipping lines have already moved there. When the port is complete, by around 2010, the city expects it to become the busiest in the world, ahead of Singapore and Hong Kong. New rail links for goods traffic around the city and out
to Jiangsu and Zhejiang will improve freight flow, as well.

The hardware is the easy bit however ? what about the ?software?, – human resources ? Roads and buildings can be built quickly in China, but developing truly international skill sets takes a lot longer. Many local university or education programs are still not well really focused on training candidates to international standards, the competition for the limited pool or truly experienced candidates is very high, and retaining good people is expensive. Local staff still have weaknesses with planning, innovation, and organisational complexity.

Equally, educating your customers in the local market about the values and benefits of service remains a challenge. Most of the potential market for services within Shanghai is still primarily among the MNCs, and while consumers are growing increasingly mature within China, local companies are still focused almost exclusively on price as opposed to the quality or value of services.

In addition, structural weaknesses remain in the economy. Apart from the hardy perennials of IP theft and government limitations and restrictions, contract law remains weak, and there are a lack of enforced standards in many industries. If you are competing for government business, you may find procurement processes can be very unclear with in many cases an ?uneven playing field?. You will find all these issues beyond Shanghai. On the other hand, we are finding that foreign investors in the manufacturing sector are increasingly moving out to places like Nanjing, Ningbo, Hefei and Hangzhou, as well as the second tier cities, to find more competitive costs. Why pay US$200/sq m in Waigaoqiao when you can pay US$30/sq m in Nanjing or US$22/sq m in Ningbo ? Land and labour are becoming increasingly expensive, and Shanghai?s development zones are approaching capacity. Government support for small projects is more difficult to obtain, and the authorities are also focusing more on high-tech and research industries, and attracting RHQs.

To support your supply chain, there are concentrations of good local companies in a wide range of sectors ? although there are still some gaps in provision. Labour costs are lower of course and skills are improving ? for example around RMB700/month for a manual worker in Hangzhou compared to RMB800-1200 in Shanghai, or RMB1500-2000 for a manager in Hefei compared to RMB5000 in Shanghai. These cities are also perfectly acceptable places to live, with small but growing expat communities and increasingly sophisticated services like schools and hospitals. There are however, very few experienced international quality professional services firms, with most services still being provided from Shanghai.

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