China Initiates the Second Revolution of Cruise Industry

On July 4, 2016, CSSC signed shipbuilding joint venture agreement on luxury cruise with Italian Fincantieri company. The two sides will set up a joint venture luxury cruise liner design and construction company in Hong Kong, China, with China cruise Technology Development Co., Ltd. taking up 60% share, and Italian Fincantieri company taking up the rest 40%. Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co. Ltd. will be responsible for the construction and delivery of the luxury cruises. The signing of the agreement gradually makes the dream of several generations to build cruise in China come true.

According to Zheng Weihang, the Executive vice President and Secretary General of Cruise Yacht Branch of China Communications and Transportation Association, China has not yet grasped this high technology ship product due to the immense difficulty of its construction. Through the cooperation with Italian Fincantieri shipyard, it can be said that China stand on the shoulders of giant and choose the road of joint development, we need not start from scratch and this directly shortens the distance between China and the world advanced countries when we start.

According to Zheng Weihang, the upstream of the industry mainly includes design, manufacturing, the midstream includes fleet's operation and port operation, and thedownstream mainly includes service industry such as tourism service, supply service, talent service. Although China's cruise industry is facing the excellent situation of development, the existence of the short board can not be ignored.

At present, the relevant ministries promote the development of the industry mostly based on their respective responsibilities rather than a planning scheme aiming at the goal, orientation, focus and space of cruise industry’s development from the angle of the overall national top level design.

Secondly, China's cruise industry chain should extend from the current commercial activities mainly of tourism and reception to the upstream and downstream industry chain. Zheng Weihang said, this includes the cruise port,supporting industry, cruise system specifications, talent training, etc. The supporting construction of the terminal area is also one of the components of the cruise industry chain. Having corresponding berth of the cruise terminal is the most basic condition to develop cruise industry.Although some coastal ports and cities had planned to construct professional cruise terminal and cruise city, but currently professional passenger liner docks had been built only in Shanghai, Xiamen and Sanya city, where many cruise terminal facilities are still not perfect. In terms of regulatory system, the cruise industry has not been listed in China’s overall planning at present, and there is not any system specification for developing cruise industry.So, there is a lack of law, regulations and policies for international cruise industry to support the investment and management in China. Under such situation, it will be inconvenient for cruise to come in and out of ports, and difficult to meet the international standards and satisfy the tourists’ requirement for quickness, convenience, comfort and other customs clearance requirements.