Abstract: Since China’s entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, the development of import and export markets has driven a rapid growth in container throughput in Chinese ports. Due to the fact that container ports serve as catalysts for regional economic development and important infrastructure for ensuring the smooth operation of international industrial and supply chains, sufficient attention and importance should be given to the construction and development of container ports.As far as container throughput is concerned, China’s ports have performed well, but due to the historical reasons for port development and the different natural resource endowments of each port region, the challenge of uneven port development in China always exists. Looking forward to the future, China will continue opening to the outside world and rely on the development of ports to trade with other countries. Thus, whether the container ports’ performance converges or diverges and how the development gap among ports would develop and evolve over timeare questions that bear significant implicationsfor port operationsand management.
Convergence is mostly used in the field of economics, referring to the phenomenon of narrowing the income gap between developing and developed countries. Club convergence is a special kind of convergence phenomenon, which means that economies with similar initial levels would converge under the effect of similar structural characteristics, so that multiple steady states coexist in the form of “intra-club convergence and inter-club divergence”. The natural conditions and resource endowments vary greatly among different regions in China, thus resulting in a certain degree of uneven development among container ports in various regions. In order to comprehend the disparity in development among ports, analyze potential factors and driving mechanisms that contribute to either the reduction or expansion of the port development gap, and investigate the underlying patterns of port development, the concept of convergence within a port system has been proposed. Club convergence in a container port system indicates that ports with similar initial conditions converge to the same steady state under the condition of similar factors affecting port development, while ports with different initial conditions are subject to different influencing factors and thus move towards different development directions and paths, thus converging to different steady states, which leads to the phenomenon of multiple port clubs coexisting in the port system.
On the basis of the concept of club convergence in a port system put forward, this paper aims to explore whether there is a phenomenon of club convergence in China’s mainland container port system in terms of the growth in port container throughput. Based on the container throughput data of 52 container ports from 2001—2020, a nonlinear time-varying factor model is utilized to investigate the unbalanced development in the port system, and during the process of the investigation, the convergence test is performed and the club clustering algorithm is applied to identify the club convergence in the container port system. Moreover, the potential factors that may affect the formation of port clubs are selected from dimensions of both the port initial conditions and port development characteristics based on the concept of club convergence. Further, the driving factors of club convergence and the convergence mechanisms are explored with the help of the Ordered Logit model. The main research results show that: (1)The container throughput growth does not lead to an overall convergence in mainland China, but four different clubs are formed. (2)The scale structure of China’s container port system is relatively concentrated, and the small and medium ports experience a stage of slow growth or even stagnation. (3)The initial conditions of a port, port city scale, foreign trade potential and industrial structure of the port city, and the growth rate of the traffic infrastructure may promote a port to a high-level club, but an economic and trade promotion is the original power for port development.
The identification of club convergence and the change in transitional paths of different port clubs in this paper show that the monopoly position of large ports will be further strengthened, and small and medium-sized ports may fall into the poverty trap, which has a reference value for port owners, managers and operators under both China’s both “one city, one port” mode and current provincial port consolidation mode (i.e.,“one province, one port”). For example, in the stage of “one city, one port”, small and medium-sized ports should focus on how to maintain their position instead of going for investment; in the stage of port integration, it is worth noting that excessive integration will make the monopoly position of large ports further strengthened and the lack of competition may also be detrimental to the development of small and medium-sized ports in each province. These are all worthy of consideration and also illustrate that the results of the club convergence study would have some policy guidance implications for container port development.

Key words: mainland China’s container port system, club convergence, ordered-logit model, driving mechanism, container throughput

摘要： 本文旨在探究中国大陆集装箱港口体系发展是否存在俱乐部收敛。基于2001—2020年52个集装箱港口的吞吐量数据,采用非线性时变因子模型对港口体系进行收敛识别和俱乐部聚类,在此基础上采用定序逻辑模型探索俱乐部收敛的驱动机制。主要研究结果表明:(1)中国大陆集装箱港口吞吐量增长不存在整体收敛,可划分为4个不同层次的俱乐部;(2)中国集装箱港口体系规模分布相对集中,部分中小港口发展相对缓慢甚至停滞;(3)港口的初始条件、港口所在城市的规模、外贸、产业结构和交通发展速度能够影响集装箱吞吐量的收敛水平,但经贸推动是港口发展的源动力。

关键词: 中国大陆集装箱港口体系, 俱乐部收敛, 定序逻辑模型, 驱动机制, 集装箱吞吐量