In an effort to accelerate the growth of regular container services to and from Nanjing, the local government announced a raft of measures on 2 November with immediate effect.

Among the measures, the government will give a one-off award of Rmb1m to shipping lines that start a weekly ocean or near-ocean route from Nanjing and to those whose regular services have been in operation for a year. It is not yet clear whether a shipping line will receive more than one award if it starts a weekly service to different destinations.

For adding regular domestic routes that call at Nanjing, shipping lines will receive a one-off award of Rmb500,000; for new calls to Shanghai Yangshan Terminals, the award will be Rmb100,000. For shipping lines using Nanjing as a transhipment centre, the award is set at Rmb150,000.

Container terminal operators will also receive funds if they achieve year-on-year handling growth rates of at least 5 per cent.