Unit 1 Maritime Transport
Part A Unit Outline
1. Courseware PPT
2. Professional Terms
This unit provides a brief introduction to maritime transport, which plays a key role in a nation's economy development.
● It is essential to study maritime transport because maritime transport is of huge economic significance as a service sector in its own right but also as an indispensable ancillary activity for international trade. Meanwhile, maritime transport chain comprises three components:the ocean carriers, the domestic ports, and the foreign ports.
● Maritime transport can be categorized as liner shipping, charter shipping, and industrial shipping, and it is the most carbon-efficient mode of transport, which is a major environmental advantage.
● In modern times, maritime transport presents some important trends, such as maturity of the containerization cycle, containerization of commodities, rationalization of the shipping and port industries, wide application of information technologies, and automation of terminal operation.
● E-commerce has had a profound impact on maritime transport, and posed new challenges to the maritime transport system and it calls for fundamental changes in the maritime transport system in various ways.
● Maritime transport industry constitutes economic activities which have some direct and indirect relationship with the sea, and is often associated with shipping lines and associated service providers.
● Some organizations such as ocean shipping company, ocean shipping agency, stevedoring company, tally company and container company are concerned with maritime transport.
● The maritime cluster consists of numerous maritime businesses which operate in close cooperation with each other and benefit from this network. Maritime clusters have both direct and indirect economic impacts, and enhance the competitiveness and growth in local maritime economy.
● Shipping markets and shipping routes, IMO (International Maritime Organization), and London port are elaborated in the further reading materials.