London: A team from the North Bund Shipping Service Cluster led by director Lu Qingdong is in London this week to promote the rapidly changing historic heartland of the Shanghai shipping business to international shipping companies wishing to set up offices or invest in China. Special visits include the Baltic Exchange, Lloyd's insurance market and Lloyd's Register.
At a seminar held in Le Meridien hotel in Piccadilly yesterday, the team outlined the massive redevelopment currently taking place in Shanghai ahead of the EXPO 2010. Of 17 projects covering 1.3 square km in North Bund, focal point will be a new international cruise terminal and a striking, 260-metre high Magnolia Building tower, to serve as a complementary landmark to the futuristic Oriental Pearl tower across the river in Pudong. Several other commercial office buildings are being constructed along a newly landscaped waterfront, earmarked for use by international shipping and logistics companies as well as other multinational corporations.
Strategically located at the junction of the Huangpu River and Suzhou Creek, North Bund remains home to some 80% of Shanghai's shipping-related enterprises, a total of over 2,000 companies, it was said. These include China's three largest shipping concerns - Coscon, China Shipping and Shanghai International Ports Group - the Shanghai Shipping Exchange and many other shipping-related associations.
Following a presentation by Seatrade editor Bob Jaques which drew parallels between the North Bund and City of London clusters, Mr Yu said he was "impressed" by the resilience that London had shown to remain the world's leading maritime centre, and that the North Bund would do well to heed its"operational lessons". [01/11/06]
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