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December 5, 2020

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Zhoushan makes the most of marine assets

Fresh tuna was unloaded from a fishing vessel at a wharf in Zhoushan National Pelagic Fishery Base on a recent afternoon.

Kaichuang 102 just completed her voyage to and from the Marshall Islands. “The tuna unloaded from the vessel will be canned, but the frozen ones moved from the container ship alongside trucks waiting at the loading dock will be used for sashimi because of their much higher quality,” said Zhou Zengren, general manager of Zhoushan Huiqun Pelagic Fishery Development Co Ltd.

While Zhou introduced the company’s catch, another fishing vessel, Hetai, was unloading squid caught in the southeast Pacific at No. 1 Wharf of the base.

The company reported 340,000 tons of catch so far this year, compared with 300,000 tons in total in 2019, according to Zhou.

“It is mainly because squid production in the southwest Atlantic increased significantly compared with last year,” said Zhou.

To ensure food safety amid the COVID-19 pandemic, fish unloaded at wharfs in the base, no matter frozen fish transported from overseas or fresh seafood caught by domestic vessels, will be fully examined, said Zhou.

Zhoushan Huiqun is just one among the fishing companies headquartered in the base, which covers more than 6 square kilometers and hosts over 150 enterprises in the pelagic fishery industry.

In the core area of the base in Ganlan Town of Zhoushan’s Dinghai District are three wharfs each with 10,000 tons of lift capacity. Accordingly, they can cope with three vessels at the same time.

At the scene, cranes unloaded fish from the vessels, put them on trucks and then they were transported to cold storage warehouses in the base. The total capacity of cold storage in the base is 350,000 tons.

Fishery processing enterprises throughout the country moved in one after another, together with large refrigerated transport ships. Fishing enterprises both within and outside the city put their storage here.

Thanks to the unparalleled port advantages, the base’s professional wharfs, cold storage logistics, trading market and other hardware facilities have been gradually improved in recent years.

Since the approval of the establishment of the base in April 2015, its scale has expanded rapidly and its functions are becoming increasingly complete. The base now owns a fleet of more than 600 pelagic fishing vessels and reported 800,000 tons of catch last year.

Its operational waters are spread over three oceans and more than 10 countries’ exclusive economic zones. The species of fish caught include squid, tuna, saury, Argentinean red shrimp and krill.

The base is mainly engaged in the development of the whole production chain, including fishing, transportation, processing and trade. Apart from focusing on the domestic market, the deep processed aquatic products are also exported to European countries, the US, Japan and South Korea.

Lin Zhigang, deputy chief commander of the base’s construction headquarters, told Shanghai Daily that as a measure to deepen supply-side structural reforms, the base was listed as a national-level supply chain innovation and application pilot unit in 2018.

“By building a one-stop supply chain service platform for pelagic aquatic products, we can promote supply chain innovation and enhance the value chain,” Lin said.

“Next, we will carry out the development of marine financial leasing and other financial supporting services, accelerate the development of the digital supply chain, open up and connect all links of the upstream, middle and lower reaches of the industrial chain; and the goal is to develop a green whole industry chain of pelagic fishery,” he added.

Born of the sea, today the Zhoushan National Pelagic Fishery Base has evolved into an internationalized and modern industrial zone integrating fishery, home port, trade and tourism.

On the shore, the Zhoushan International Grain and Oil Industrial Park reported an annual grain import of more than 15 million tons, accounting for 13 percent of the country’s total; of which soybean is more than 13.5 million tons, accounting for 15 percent of the national import.

As an important part of Zhejiang International Agricultural Products Trade Center, the industrial park next to Dinghai’s Laotangshan Port has become an important grain distribution center and processing trade base in the eastern coastal areas of China.

The planned area of the industrial park is 4.41 square kilometers and ready to berth 50,000 tons (also accessible to 80,000 tons) and 150,000 tons (also accessible to 200,000 tons) of cargo vessels.

The industrial park also has a 30,000-ton and a 5,000-ton shipping terminal. The annual throughput capacity of the port reaches 36.6 million tons.

There are more than 30 grain and oil processing and storage enterprises in the industrial park. At present, the grain processing capacity of the park is 2.8 million tons per year, and the storage capacity is 850,000 tons, with another 750,000 tons under construction and 1.3 million tons planned.

“Our park is one of the first designated ports for imported grain, one of the core blocks of national port logistics hub, and a provincial logistics demonstration park,” said an official with the industrial park’s administrative committee.

Give full play to the advantages of Zhejiang free trade zone and Zhoushan river-sea intermodal transport service center, the effect of industrial agglomeration is further revealed, as the Zhejiang grain storage and logistics project of China Grain Storage is ready to go.

The project, with an investment of 1.3 billion yuan (US$198 million), plans to build a warehouse capacity of more than 500,000 tons with 14 hectares of land, including 288,000 tons of warehouse capacity in the first stage.

Also in Dinghai, one car after another went onto the 140-meter-long and 24-meter-wide ro-ro (roll-on, roll-off) ship Chang Fa Long from the China Merchants Group (Zhoushan) Ro/Ro Terminal in Dinghai Industrial Park earlier last month.

The cars will be transported to Tianjin Port by ro-ro vehicle logistics mode. This marks the formal operation of the first specialized automobile ro-ro terminal in Zhoushan.

The operation of the terminal is of great significance not only to serve the Zhoushan river-sea intermodal transport center and promote the development of regional industrial economy, but also to further promote the diversified development of Zhoushan’s industrial economy.

Apart from industrial development, Dinghai is a beautiful island on the East China Sea and hometown of the “wandering writer” Sanmao, or Echo Chan (1943-1991).

In 1989, after wandering around the world for most of her life, the legendary woman finally decided to return to her hometown to find her roots.

In Dinghai’s Xiaosha Community, Sanmao abandoned all the shackles and worries, offering sacrifices to ancestors, visiting ancestral houses, embracing and talking with her uncle and aunt, and cycling on the ridge.

Tong Jiao, a community official, said that Xiaosha is where the Sanmao Prose Prize is issued and awarded.

“We will strive to become a national prose creation base, display a distinctive brand image, attract literary lovers and fans from all over the world to travel and communicate, and become the research and learning travel base for primary and secondary school students in China.”

As a new round of development of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) is on the way, people in Dinghai District, with a brand-new attitude, is determined to write a better future.




 

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