On September 28, SIPG held a press conference for the launch of its Yangtze River Port and Shipping Blockchain Integrated Service Platform. The conference was attended by leaders of Shanghai Customs, Shanghai Maritime Safety Administration, Shanghai Municipal Transportation Commission and the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce as well as Gu Jinshan, SIPG Party Secretary and Chairman, Yan Jun, SIPG Deputy Party Secretary and President and Vice Presidents Wang Haijian and Zhang Xin. The official inauguration of the platform was also witnessed by representatives of international shipping lines such as COSCO Shipping, CMA-CGM, Evergreen and OOCL as well as from major ports and shipping companies along the Yangtze River, who jointly signed a framework agreement for cooperation on the new platform.

The platform represents an important step taken by SIPG to propel fresh growth of trade and logistics along the Yangtze River Economic Belt and improve capacity of Shanghai as an international shipping center. Incorporating blockchain technologies onto a digital platform, it is safe, transparent, efficient, accessible and not-for-profit, offering services to be shared by varied users. With the aim of promoting online and offline collaboration between ports, shipping companies and cargo operators, the platform will enable real-time tracking across the logistical chain, increase operational efficiency of all stakeholders and lower the overall shipping costs, thus empowering the ecosystem and adding value for all. This fully testifies to SIPG’s conviction, confidence and capability in serving development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt and implementing the national strategy of integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta.  

Leveraging unique features of blockchain such as distributed ledger, smart contracts, real-time consensus, data customization and encryption mechanism as well as non-tampering, the platform ensures that information is confidential, accurate and traceable, and constructs a new trust mechanism that offers whole-cycle controllable, diverse services and multi-layered functions to all users.

Its main functions are fourfold: first, improve the integrity and uniqueness of information on vessels, containers and cargos on the Yangtze River to achieve dynamic whole-cycle tracing and provide reliable visual tracking to various stakeholders throughout the cycle; second, by introducing concepts of sharing economy and promoting slot exchange, it enhances efficiency of resource use, facilitates standardization of feeder vessels along the Yangtze River, and promotes point-to-point regular transportation through feeder booking services; third, coordinate efficient collaboration across the value chain between ports, feeder operators, carriers providing major trade lanes services, ship agencies and freight forwarders and truck fleets; forth, activate resources of ports, shipping companies and traders and advance cooperation within and across relevant industries through an open service platform.

The eleven provinces across the Yangtze River Economic Belt account for over 40% of the nation’s total international trade. As the pivot of the golden waterway on the Yangtze River, Shanghai Port has the world’s highest density of shipping routes with the largest container throughput for ten consecutive years. In 2019, container throughput of foreign traded goods handled across waterways of the Yangtze River topped 10.27 million TEUs.

Acting on the concepts of development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, Port of Shanghai has strived to upgrade logistical and feeder vessel service systems and expand and further activate distribution network. This is based on the overall new development paradigm of having domestic circulation as the mainstay and with domestic and international circulations reinforcing each other. With more data from our service platforms going onto the blockchain, the Yangtze River Port and Shipping Blockchain will be fostered gradually and become an important component of the global shipping blockchain. In this process, scenario applications such as certificate optimization throughout our supply chain and cargo tracking across the globe will be realized one after another.

Going forward, we expect more quality products and services to be launched in the ecosystem built around our new platform. At the moment, SIPG is partnering with Ant Group to introduce a new financing product, “Tuishuibao” (namely, Tax Refund), leveraging reliable information on the newly-launched blockchain service platform. Designed for exporting companies, “Tuishuibao” stands as a new logistics value added service for our exporter clients that helps them achieve higher efficiency in both logistics and capital use.

With its financing service for online tax refund, “Tuishuibao” helps exporters overcome difficulties associated with tax refunds such as long review periods and locked-up funds, and expand their financing options and increase the efficiency of capital turnover.

As a pioneer of fusing port business with finance, SIPG is stepping up to implement the national strategy of pursuing steady growth and to better meet our clients’ needs. We are opening up a new chapter for future connectivity between data, capital, logistics and trade and further improvement in comprehensive services and innovation across the whole logistical chain of “Yangtze River- Shanghai-the world”.