Shipping ecosystem: concept and policy implications

While a port hub primarily focuses on cargo handling and basic logistics functions centered around port operations, a shipping hub encompasses a broader scope of activities, integrating various transportation modes and providing extensive value-added services to support global trade and supply chains. A shipping ecosystem can be perceived as the multilateral framework of a shipping hub, comprising multiple maritime sectors that interact with each other and the operational environment to create a focal value proposition. Drawing on the ecosystem concept, this study employs an analytical logic around several key questions on shipping ecosystem evolution: “why,” “what,” and “how.” Answering these questions provides theoretical support regarding why the shipping ecosystem exists through analogies between the shipping community and ecosystems in other study fields, such as biology, business, and industry. The 3C elements of the shipping ecosystem (Core actors, Cooperating sectors, and Circumstance factors) are identified and used to clarify what constitutes a shipping ecosystem. Clarifying the shipping ecosystem based on ecological theory, this study establishes a conceptual framework to explain how the shipping ecosystem functions. On this basis, this paper constructs a multi-dimensional indicating system to detect how the shipping ecosystem undergoes specialization transformation, lifecycle evolution, and generation shifts. Through observing the shipping ecosystem evolution process from different dimensions, several propositions, linking shipping ecosystem evolution and shipping hub development, are developed to advance knowledge of shipping ecosystems, with practical and policy implications provided. Policymakers are advised to improve their shipping hub configurations and performance ahead of competition, especially those in a state of transition.