In the first 8 months of this year, Tianjin Port imported over 80 million tons of mineral products (see picture)

The picture shows customs officers sampling imported manganese ore. Tianjin Customs/Photo

Recently, the "Hannah" cargo ship loaded with 168000 tons of imported manganese ore docked at Tianjin Port's Yuanhang Ore Terminal. Tianjin Customs officers, who had already prepared for inspection, immediately boarded the ship to carry out weight appraisal work on the batch of goods. The manganese ore that has passed customs inspection will be gradually transported to refineries in North China, Northwest China and other places, laying a solid foundation for the domestic steel smelting industry as raw materials.

According to statistics from Tianjin Customs, from January to August 2026, Tianjin Port imported a total of 82.817 million tons of mineral products, a year-on-year increase of 7%. Among them, imported manganese ore sand was 15.564 million tons, a year-on-year increase of 13.5%, and imported chromium ore sand was 15.17 million tons, a year-on-year increase of 34%. The import volume continues to lead the country.

Tianjin Port is an important ore import and distribution hub in northern China, mainly supplying smelting enterprises in northern regions such as Beijing Tianjin Hebei. With characteristic businesses such as 300000 ton professional large-scale ore berths and sea rail intermodal transportation, it provides important raw material guarantees for the northern steel industry, especially for the import advantages of metal ores such as iron, manganese, and chromium.

In order to ensure smoother import of mineral products at Tianjin Port, Tianjin Customs has established a dedicated "enterprise small service" delivery policy team based on the characteristics of large ship types, wide sources, and rich categories of imported mineral products. We insist on providing advanced services, push policies that benefit enterprises such as early declaration and conditional departure, and guide enterprises to complete online declaration before berthing.

At the same time, it helps to leverage the effectiveness of the bonded warehouse policy for imported mineral products. Relevant mineral products can be directly stored in the warehouse upon arrival at the port, and enterprises do not need to pay taxes in advance. Subsequently, combined with the production pace of downstream steel mills and market conditions, they can be picked up in batches as needed, effectively alleviating the pressure of capital occupation on enterprises and achieving flexible allocation of raw materials. At present, the bonded warehousing capacity of mineral products at Tianjin Port has reached 228000 square meters, which can not only support domestic import enterprises to stock up and ensure supply in large quantities, but also carry out transit distribution and bonded transit business, effectively releasing Tianjin Port's competitive advantage as a northern mineral product distribution hub.

In addition, on the basis of optimizing traditional regulatory models, Tianjin Customs actively promotes regulatory models such as smart water gauge weighing, smart telecommunications quarantine, and smart inspection assistants. The clearance efficiency of bulk mineral products has significantly improved, helping Tianjin Port to continuously enhance its attractiveness to mineral product operators. (Wu Yuebo, Wu Yun/text)