Standard Chartered’s Madhur Jha and Ethan Lester highlight that around 80% of global trade moves via sea routes, with Asia, and particularly China, increasingly dominant in port rankings and liner shipping connectivity. They note that enhanced Chinese connectivity and rising intra-EM trade are reshaping global logistics, relative terms of trade, current account performance and supply-chain stress dynamics since the 2025 tariff shock.
China’s connectivity reshapes global trade flows
“Around 80% of global trade is transported over sea routes and handled at ports. Reflecting growing intra-EM trade, World Shipping Council data shows that ports in Vietnam, Morocco, Thailand and India entered the world’s top 25 ports for twenty-foot-equivalent units (TEU) of cargo processing in 2024.”
“China now has 11 of its ports in the top 25, displacing several European, US and Australian ports. These shifting patterns have implications for the global logistics industry, relative terms of trade, C/A performance, potential penalties for tariff avoidance, and competition over supply-chain nodes.”
“Port dominance is strongly linked with UNCTAD’s Liner Shipping Connectivity Index (LSCI), a composite measure that tracks the number of observed ship arrivals, cargo volume capacity, provision of shipping services by companies, and the ability to complete a journey without layovers.”
“Despite escalating trade tensions over the last decade, China has extended its lead over all other economies in terms of global liner shipping connectivity. China’s bilateral connectivity is broad-based across regions, allowing its exporters to tap efficiently into external demand.”
“China’s enhanced global liner shipping connectivity may be keeping a lid on container shipping disruptions affecting global supply chains, which have risen steadily since the ‘Liberation Day’ tariff shock in April 2025. China’s contribution to the World Bank’s Global Supply Chain Stress Index has decreased from c.50% before COVID to c.20% more recently.”
(This article was created with the help of an Artificial Intelligence tool and reviewed by an editor.)