Progress in Research on Port Geography in China

Abstract

Port geography is an important aspect of transportation geography. To reveal the context and characteristics of port geography research in China, we selected 24 high-quality Chinese journals published by The Geographical Society of China and China Society of Natural Resources. 552 papers related to Port Geography from these journals between 1982 and 2022 were analyzed, the results showed that research on Port geography in China has been through initial, exploration, rapid development, and research perspective transformation stages. This field has five main themes: hinterland studies, the systems, networks, and development of ports, and port-city relationships. Research on port hinterlands focuses on the integrated development of port hinterlands. However, there is still a need for further exploration because the measurement of port system centralization and decentralization is the focal point of port systems. With the development of multimodal transportation, changes in port systems have intensified the competition among ports, which scholars have tended to interpret from a macroscopic perspective. The structure of port networks involves topics such as topological spatial arrangements, changes in network structure, and network security assessments. Scholars place particular emphasis on the impact of port networks on China's development. Prior development studies have been based on comprehensive planning that considers natural, economic, and societal conditions, port layout, and site selection as crucial research subjects. However, in recent years, some emerging development strategies have started to investigate port logistics and enterprises, and port terminals, offering recommendations and considering the interests of businesses; The research on port-city relationships centers on the development of the port-city interface, and analysis of waterfront areas also captures the interest of scholars. The economic relationship between the port and the city is relatively complex, and scholars have not yet reached a consensus on it. Overall, research focusses on the impact on the national economy, but theories are relatively lacking. Port geography research in China has paid little attention to society, institutions, culture, or supply chains that are popular in Western research. In future, we should pay attention to the impact of extreme weather and geopolitics, deepen research on ports' internal wharves and enterprises, promote the application of Automatic Identification System data, and construct theories on port logistics.

Keywords

• port geography
• port networks
• supply chain security
• chinese ports