Harbouring ambitions: China’s port giants make waves with record growth

Even as global trade weathered extreme volatility in 2025, China is pressing ahead with port expansions, building bigger and more strategically positioned hubs to secure its trade future.

In the first 11 months of 2025, China’s foreign trade container throughput jumped 9.5 per cent, year on year, to 320 million 20-foot equivalent units (TEU), contributing to a record US$1.19 trillion trade surplus for the full year, according to official data.

Major ports helped drive the records. Shanghai, for instance, handled more than 50 million TEU in container throughput from January to November, surpassing 2024’s full-year total and putting it on track to set a new annual record, according to the Shanghai International Port Group.

And by early December, the Ningbo-Zhoushan Port in Zhejiang province eclipsed 40 million TEU in container throughput, making it only the third port globally – after Shanghai and Singapore – to reach that milestone in a full year, according to customs authorities in Ningbo.

Zhen Hong, a professor at Shanghai Maritime University, said China’s port capacity is expected to continue growing over the next five years, albeit at a slower pace than in previous years. He emphasised that “transport comes first”, calling “forward-looking port infrastructure” essential in underpinning hinterland development and trade expansion.

Full-year exports for 2025 climbed 5.5 per cent from a year earlier to US$3.77 trillion, remaining a pillar of the world’s second-largest economy, according to customs data released on Wednesday. This occurred despite China’s pursuit of a new growth model centred on consumption and domestic demand, shifting from a more traditional reliance on investment and trade.

South China Morning Post