An Evaluation of Container Ports in China and Korea with the Analytic Hierarchy Process

Since China adopted its liberalized economic policy, the average growth rate of Chinese economy has exceeded 10% per annum. Especially, port development and advancement in China are conspicuous in the case which refers to import and export, as China handles approximately 90% of the relevant cargo by relying upon maritime transport. Such remarkable growth in China gives an impetus to Korean ports, since both China and Korea are located at the same region in Northeast Asia, and the two lie in direct competition. In this respect, the purpose of this study is to figure out the order of competitive power of container ports, which are situated on China's east and south coasts, even including ports of Korea. The Analytic Hierarchy Process(AHP) method has been adopted as the methodology of this study, which is a method of problem solving-decision making.