RESEARCH ON INTERNATIONAL MULTIMODAL

TRANSPORT DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY IN CHINA

Xin Zang

School of Economics and Management, Beijing Jiaotong University, Beijing, China

Keywords: International multimodal transport, Development trends, Strategy.

Abstract: As a kind of senior organization form, multimodal transport can integrate the advantages of various modes

of transport。By means of seamless linking, Multimodal transport is able to improve efficiency and quality

and meet the requirement of individual needs in the transportation, which makes it important in the

environment of global competition. After nearly four decades of construction and development, China has

acquired remarkable achievements in multimodal transport. However, there still exists great gap between

developed countries. Currently, the relationship between international multimodal transport and the field of

manufacture is becoming increasingly close, International multimodal transport network has become the

core resource and business of shipping companies have tried to continually penetrate to the land. Under this

kind of situation, in order to promote the development of multimodal transport in china, we must actively

foster operators of large-scale international multimodal transport business. Meanwhile, we need to construct

international multimodal transport network, improve the management structure and eliminate institutional

obstacles to development. We should make a breakthrough in the combination of sea and railway transport

and try to promote the development of network between land and sea transport. Great efforts should be

made to accelerate the application of advanced information technology in the business of international

multimodal transport.

1 CURRENT DEVELOPMENT

OF INTERNATIONAL

MULTIMODAL TRANSPORT

IN CHINA

In China, international container transport started in

1970s. After the government promulgated

“Management Rules of the International Container

Multimodal Transport” in 1997, container

multimodal transport in China entered the high-

speed development period. During nearly four

decades of development, multimodal transport

industry has formed main features as follow aspects:

 Rapid expansion of multimodal transport

scales.

 Collaborative transport as the main form.

 Transport in high seas as the main mode.

 Continental Bridge transport as the

characteristics.

 Substantial improvement in infrastructure and

hardware standards basically complied with

international standards.

1.1 Rapid Expansion of Multimodal

Transport Scales

Although no specific statistics on intermodal

transport has been found, based on multimodal

transport data from individual ports, the total

multimodal transport amount in China presents a

rapid growth trend. For example, in 2006, the

amount of Sea Combined Transport in Shanghai port

reached 200 million TEUs, accounting for 9.2% of

port container throughput; sea and railway transport

volume reached 84,000 TEUs, accounting for 0.4%

of port container throughput, etc. Although

intermodal transport did not account for a very high

proportion in container throughput, the trends in

recent years showed that average annual growth rate

sea and railway transport up to 30%, Jianghai

transport volume growth also exceeded 20%.

1.2 Collaborative Transport as the

Main Form

According to the organization form of multimodal

333

Zang X..

RESEARCH ON INTERNATIONAL MULTIMODAL TRANSPORT DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY IN CHINA.

DOI: 10.5220/0003562503330336

In Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (ICEIS-2011), pages 333-336

ISBN: 978-989-8425-55-3

 2011 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)

transport, it could be divided into collaborative type

and connecting type. Collaborative multimodal

refers to the process that enterprises which own two

or more modes of transport take over the goods and

ship them to the designated delivery premises, in

accordance with the unified regulations or

agreement. Connecting multimodal refers to the

process that the multimodal transport operators

organize enterprises which own two or more modes

of transport to take over the goods and ship them to

the designated delivery premises. At present,

Collaborative multimodal is still the main operation

form of multimodal transport. Under this kind of

operation form, each carrier needs to complete the

actual transportation task as well as convergence and

organization of related freight. Then they need to

take risks or distribute benefits under the relevant

contracts or agreements.

1.3 Transport in High Seas as the Main

Mode

According to different combination of transport

modes, there exist different multimodal transport

forms, such as, road and railway transport, sea and

railway transport and high seas transport, etc. The

practical situation showed that the high seas

intermodal transport is still the main mode of

transport in China. Limited by the railway

management system and capability, combined

transport associated with the railway transport in

China has shown a declining trend. Particularly, the

enormous potential of sea-rail transport is difficult to

be found and transport of containers from ports to

inland area could only rely on the road, which made

the efficiency dissatisfied. In developed countries,

the rail transport share of total port container

throughput is usually 20% to 40%, while the figure

is only 1.5% in China in 2007.

Road and railway transport in the land crossings

played an important role, but it is constricted by the

railway container transport management system

either. Some other transport means (such as air and

railway transport, air and water transport) has also

made some developments in recent years, but

generally speaking, those developments is

comparatively very small.

1.4 Continental Bridge Transport as

the Characteristics

China has a natural advantage on Continental Bridge

transport, and three land bridges supply lines we

have are able to maintain a volume about 1 million

TEUs per year. Short distance and accelerated speed

of operation has not only greatly reduced the

transport time, but also saved the transportation cost

about 20% to 30%. The huge advantage has greatly

increased the throughput of the land crossings.

However, considering the needs of transit

declaration in many countries, in addition to the

different rail standard in European, advantage of

Continental Bridge transport could be greatly

reduced.

2 PROBLEMS FACED BY

CHINA’S INTERNATIONAL

MULTIMODAL TRANSPORT

2.1 Unintegrated Management System

Directly Reduces the Efficiency of

International Multimodal

Transport (IMT)

Multimodal transport involves cooperation and

integration of different kinds of transportation. It’s

essential to design the management system in an

overall perspective in order to take the advantages of

multimodal transport. However, now China still

adopts single-modal management system, leading to

a lack of coordination and cooperation between

different departments, poor integration among

infrastructures, unreasonable work division of

transport methods as well as blind competitions on

sources of same goods. A lack of information

sharing also results in negative influence such as

multimodal transport’s complex process,

complicated procedures and low efficiency.

2.2 Inadequate Railway

Transportation Capacity is the Key

Element Strangling the

Development of Ship-with-train

Transportation

In the total national-wide requirement for train, only

35% of them can be met. All over the nation, each

day there are 280,000 to 290,000 railway carriages

that are need by different places but the maximum

loading capacity of our railway department is only

about 100,000 carriages. The lack of transportation

capacity has seriously impeded the development of

ship-with-train transportation. With the continuously

promotion of our Socialist market economic system,

the old planning management system without

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separation of the government and corporations of

our railway department will further fall behind the

quick response required by the multimodal transport.

2.3 The Capacity of Domestic Cargo

Forwarder is Too Limited to

Undertake IMT Business

At present, although there are tens of thousands of

forwarders enterprises, few of them can undertake

the business of IMT, which requires strong capacity,

including international transport network and ability

of negotiating with large liner company to ensure

“door-to-door” service. Now, of our current

multimodal enterprises are mostly in small-scale,

with an operation model of transferring the cargo to

strong IMT enterprises. However, the model full of

layers of agents and subcontractors is bound to add

the possibility of asymmetric information got by

different agents, then leading to potential obstacles

as well as risks in the process of the multimodal

transport.

3 THE DEVELOPMENT TRENDS

OF IMT

3.1 Clear Trend of Integration of IMT

and Enterprises’ Manufacturing

Sector

Modern competition environment demands a quick

response to customers’ needs and reducing the cost

and time consumed during transportation of goods.

It leads to higher requirements for logistics, which

are just the goals of the multimodal transport. With

the deepening realization of how important the

modern logistics is, the multimodal transport has

been an important consideration during making

enterprises’ strategies. More and more enterprises

outsource the transportation, international trade

cargo transportation, in particular to the operators of

IMT who provide integration services.

3.2 The Core Resource of IMT —

International Network

The “door-to-door” services, which cross the border,

provided by IMT, require the operator to enlarge its

abroad multimodal network by setting up branches

or cooperating with foreign corporations, in order to

construct its own IMT network. It needs strong

financial strength to back up and to consider the

scale and stability of goods resources before setting

up a branch on an outlet. As for cooperating with

foreign corporations, it demands to take credit risks

into consideration. Forging a partnership also needs

some time to test. No matter through which method,

as long as the IMT network is forged, it will be the

enterprise’s core resource, ensuring strong service

ability as well as high credit, helping the enterprise

to provide better multimodal service. Now, only a

few of large global logistics enterprises possess the

IMT network. Most of the multi-modal transport

work is done by each operator step by step. With the

relationship among transport methods’ turning from

competition to cooperation, each multimodal subject

is seeking cooperation actively, greatly improving

the coverage of multimodal transport network.

3.3 Increasing Percentage of LCL

(Less Container Loading) and

Higher Technical Requirement for

LCL

With customers’ needs becoming more and more

unique and diversified, there are less bulk goods but

more categories. More and more goods need to be

put in LCL. Therefore, the percentage of LCL will

increase, so does its value. Certainly, personalized

goods in diversified categories set higher technical

requirement for LCL. How to ensure the goods are

delivered to consignees safely, timely and

accurately? It’s both a challenge and an opportunity

for the operators of multimodal transport.

4 OUR STRATEGY AND

REACTION

4.1 Actively Fostering Large-scale

International Multimodal

Transport Operator and Building

the International Transport

Network

The key to successfully operate multimodal

transport is to bring up a number of international,

multi-modal scale enterprises. At present, the

transport market in China is still scattered, chaotic

and poor, while transport companies are numerous,

small and weak. There are few large companies

which can undertake the international transport

business. In order to promote the development of

international multimodal transport and try to respond

RESEARCH ON INTERNATIONAL MULTIMODAL TRANSPORT DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY IN CHINA

335

competition from multinational logistics giant, we

should actively cultivate large international

multimodal transport operator, and support to build

international intermodal transport network.

Specifically, mergers and acquisitions in the industry

should be strengthened and international intermodal

business entities like the united parcel service's

should be extensively established. Meanwhile,

various aspects of research on multimodal transport

organizations, such as, internal conditions, formation

form and running mechanism should be

strengthened to offer organizational guarantee for

the development of multimodal transport.

4.2 Improving the Management

Structure and Eliminating

Institutional Obstacles to

Development

Seamless and efficient combination between

different modes of transport is the fundamental

characteristic of multimodal transport. This kind of

combination is not only referred to the

internationalization of hardware standards, but also

reflected on the interface of system and co-

ordination of various departments. Specifically, In

order to meet the needs of the development of

international multimodal container transport,

interface between the different transport

infrastructures should be fully considered during the

transport infrastructure planning and construction.

Particular efforts should be made to reform the

current management system of Multimodal

transport, and try to build an integrated traffic

management system. In this process, we need to

avoid overlapping management and simplify

procedures for transport between different

departments and truly achieve seamless converge

between the different modes of transport. In

addition, in face of the situation that multimodal

transport laws and regulations in China are related to

multiple departments, we should further improve

and perfect laws and regulations on Container

Transport and try to strengthen enforcement in the

long run.

4.3 Making a Breakthrough on the Sea

and Railway Transport and

Promoting the Development of

Network between Land and Sea

Transport

Judging by the developing tendency of the container

transportation in China, the forceful promotion of

joint-transportation of the sea and railway, of the

river and the sea is not only the only way to boost

the container transportation industry, but also the

essential choice by which the railway transportation

could further prosper. Railway transportation has

enjoyed the advantage of long-distance

transportation of low cost, which, however, has

demonstrated little significance due to its inherited

restrictions of the management system. On the other

hand, coupled with the rapid development of the

harbors in China, the total port throughput has

ranked No. one around the globe in six successive

years. Therefore, in the first place, we should reform

our planned management system, which is neither

administrative, nor commercialized, and realize the

separated-network operation pattern. In the second

place, we should benefit from the fast developing

harbors, to construct regional, integrated container

transportation network centered around the harbors.

Shift the focus on the consigned road transportation

to more potential railway transportation and inland

waterway transportation, with the expectation to

build a multichannel multidirectional and

multimodal, transportation network.

REFERENCES

Yu, H., J. 2007. On the international freight forwarding

and international multimodal transport. Heilongjiang

Foreign trade.

Rong, Z., Ke, H., J. 2007. Multimodal transport

development trends and China's Countermeasures.

Integrated Transport.

Ming, Y. Z., 2005. International multimodal transport

development in China. Containerization

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