Ningbo Zhoushan Port - the world's largest port by throughput volume for the past 11 years – handles 568.89 million metric tons of cargo in the first half of this year, up 2 percent year-on-year. [Photo/cnnb.com.cn]

Ningbo Zhoushan Port - the world's largest port by throughput volume for the past 11 years - handled 568.89 million metric tons of cargo in the first half of this year, up 2 percent year-on-year, according to statistics released by the Ministry of Transport.

It handled 13.25 million Twenty-Foot Equivalent Units (TEUs) – standard 20 foot shipping containers - over the six-month period, 4.7 percent less than last year. 

In June, container throughput at the port reported positive growth for the first time this year, standing at 2.53 million TEUs, a yearly uptick of 4.5 percent.

The scenario is largely due to the port operator's efforts to seek out new growth drivers.

The port has made strong efforts to expand its presence in the domestic market and stabilize its number of overseas container routes. 

From January to June, it handled 8.3 percent more domestic containers than last year.

Meanwhile, the port has also stepped up efforts to develop an integrated sea-railway transportation system. Goods are offloaded onto trains in Ningbo and then transported overseas by sea, and vice versa.

On April 15, the new Chuanshan Port Area was established, which is designed as part of the sea-rail combined transport system. By the end of May, a paperless procedure for handling containers was introduced at the port, which has helped improve the efficiency of sea-rail combined transport. 

Currently, the service has covered 54 cities across the nation. In the first half of this year, its sea-rail combined transport volume totaled 444,000 containers, 15.1 percent more than the same month last year.