The Port of Hamburg, an important hub for Sino-European trade, will participate in the China International Import Expo (CIIE) for the third consecutive year. Although the coronavirus pandemic keeps overwhelming the world, Lars Anke, from Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG, left Berlin one month ago for Shanghai to participate in this expo. This time, he has even higher expectations.

(Staff members from the Port of Hamburg pose at the second CIIE in 2019)

The Port of Hamburg, a deep-water harbor off the North Sea on the Elbe River in Germany, is the country’s largest port and the largest sea-rail combined port in Europe. It has become the most important gateway port for China to enter Europe and China has become its most important trading partner.

This strategic relationship makes the port highly value the CIIE and accordingly it has especially dispatched Anke to Shanghai before the opening of the grand event. Although the entry control measures and quarantine rules are quite complicated in China, Anke is happy that he managed to arrive in Shanghai.

He said that he made his decision to join in the third expo last year. In his view, CIIE is a broad platform gathering various industries where he can learn not only the new trends of China's logistics industry, but also the needs of other industries.

"Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG not only has a port business, but also has a railway sector, which participates in China's Belt & Road. I hope that this year's CIIE will still be an efficient platform for reaching more Chinese partners, so as to expand the sea and rail transport network of the Port of Hamburg," said Anke.

(The booth of the Port of Hamburg at 2019 CIIE)

It is via CIIE that the business of the Port of Hamburg in China has kept expanding in the past two years. For the China-Europe Express trains from Hamburg only, new destinations have been developed such as Xi’an, Hefei, and Harbin. In 2018 and 2019, more than 200 scheduled international freight trains connected Hamburg to more than 20 cities in China every week. Moreover, the total annual volume of goods transported by rail between Hamburg and China exceeds 100,000 TEUs.

Pan Hua, chief representative of the Hamburg Liaison Office China, said that the port is striving to build itself into a smart port, so they are also seeking Chinese partners in this aspect at the upcoming expo.

Although the pandemic has hit hard on the port business, the sea-rail combined network connecting the port to the world is still operating smoothly, even at the worst time of the pandemic.

The pandemic has also evoked Anke to rethink and appraise more of globalization.“Global problems need a global solution. In the future, the Port of Hamburg will not only expand Europe's sea-rail combined transport network, but also strengthen close cooperation with Asia and other parts of the world and jointly promote some projects.”

(Video by Jiang Meiqing)