New duty-free shop planned for cruise passengers
The Wusongkou International Cruise Liner Port in Baoshan opens two new terminal buildings last month to further expand the capacity of Asia’s largest cruise liner port in north Shanghai.
Baoshan District plans to build a new duty-free store for cruise liner passengers near the Wusongkou port.
The duty-free store is planned for Changtan, on the banks of the Yangtze River. The former container dock is being developed into a high-end residential and commercial zone.
“The district has applied to open a duty-free store similar to those in Hainan,” Wang Hong, Party secretary of Baoshan told a press conference yesterday.
The world’s largest duty-free shop in Sanya in Hainan opened in 2014. Another in the provincial capital Haikou opened in 2011 and has since recorded more than 31.5 billion yuan (US$5 billion) in sales.
The Wusongkou international cruise liner port in Baoshan currently has a duty-free store in its old terminal building for outbound passengers. The store brought in 100 million yuan in 2017, according Wang Younong, chairman of the port.
A new duty-free store will serve inbound passengers, Wang said. Two new terminal buildings opened last month to further expand Asia’s largest cruise liner port.
China is the world’s second largest cruise liner port with huge potential for further growth, said Andrew Williams, general manager of the Seatrade Cruise Asia Pacific Congress, an industry event to be held in Baoshan in October.
Top executives from the world’s cruise lines and government officials will attend the congress to discuss China’s influence on the global cruise market and the challenges faced by China.
