This year, Qingdao will advance the construction of an international shipping center, focusing on nine key areas, including speeding up project development, expanding its global network, and strengthening shipping and trade.

In recent years, several high-end shipping resources have been increasing their presence in Qingdao. For instance, the Asian headquarters of the Greek Phoenix Register of Shipping (PHRS) has been set up in the Qingdao free trade zone, and PICC Property and Casualty has established a marine insurance pilot zone in the city. The first domestically built large cruise ship, Adora Magic City, has visited Qingdao, and law firms such as Tahota Law Firm and Shanghai River Delta Law Firm have established operations here.

Since 2025, the concentrated presence of high-end shipping resources has boosted Qingdao's maritime capability. In the 2025 Xinhua-Baltic International Shipping Centre Development Index, Qingdao surpassed Tokyo, Japan, and Busan, South Korea, for the first time, climbing to 13th place globally and maintaining its leading position among northern port clusters.

With its international hub seaport, regional aviation hub, and high-level platforms like the Shanghai Cooperation Organization demonstration zone, Qingdao has a solid foundation for this goal.

The city's 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–30) proposes speeding up the construction of a world-class shipping center. A recently issued mid-term plan outlines a spatial layout featuring "five major clusters", including the Qianwan modern shipping service cluster and the SCO multimodal transport zone, to foster a competitive shipping service industry.

For this year, the city aims for a port cargo throughput exceeding 740 million metric tons and container throughput reaching 35 million twenty-foot equivalent units. Targets also include expanding the scale of ship transactions, key reforms like "bonded bunkering licensing", and attracting over 35 cruise ship operational voyages.

This year, Qingdao advances the construction of an international shipping center by focusing on nine key areas. [Photo/Guanhai News]