Cosco boss eyes NZ

Chinese shipping line and ports company Cosco Group is considering port investment opportunities in New Zealand, says its global chairman and chief executive, Captain Wei Jiafu.

Mr Wei, who is visiting New Zealand this week, is a former president of the China Ship Owners' Association, and is now the deputy chairman of the China Merchants' Bank, which is connected to the top echelon of the Chinese government.

The recently signed free trade agreement between China and New Zealand would increase trade between the countries, he said. "If we were looking to expand our port network we would want a port in Australia or New Zealand," he said.

International shipping consultancy Alphaliner says Cosco is the world's No7 container shipping line. It owns port terminals in nearly all the major Chinese ports, Singapore, the Suez Canal, Italy, Belgium, Holland and the United States, with one probably soon in Greece.

Rockpoint Corporate Finance executive director Chris Stone said he did not think there was enough traffic between China and New Zealand to justify Cosco setting up a terminal here in the short term.

Maersk was the only international shipping line with enough traffic to justify a terminal here, he said.

Cosco more than doubled its after-tax profit in the first six months of this year despite a 7.4 per cent year-on-year drop in container traffic across the Pacific to the US.

Mr Wei said he headed an internal study group last year that sought to predict the effect of the US subprime mortgage crisis on the world economy.

As a result, Cosco reduced the number of ships it was commissioning and moved all its money into Chinese banks.

"The facts were, according to my forecast last year, from bad going to worse."

- © Fairfax NZ News