-- During his visit to Tianjin Port in early 2019, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for efforts to develop it into a world-class smart and green port, which can better serve the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region as well as the joint building of the Belt and Road.

-- Despite the pandemic-induced impacts, Tianjin Port handled 18.35 million Twenty-foot Equivalent Units (TEUs) in 2020, up 6.1 percent from the previous year, ranking among the top 10 in the world.

-- Located at the coastal area of Bohai, China's continental sea, Tianjin Port has a shorter distance from the country's inland ports, such as Alataw Pass in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and Manzhouli and Erenhot in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region -- all important border ports along the Belt and Road. Therefore, sea-railway combined transportation has become a preferred choice that serves the Belt and Road.

by Xinhua writers Wang Jinye, Wang Minghao, Li Laifang and Lyu Qiuping

TIANJIN, May 30 -- Under the scorching sun, a dockside crane in Tianjin Port lifted a container out of a vessel before the container was locked onto a tow truck and carried away.

The entire process was going on in a manless operation zone at the port in north China's Tianjin Municipality, which aims to become a smart, green hub connecting the world via the Belt and Road Initiative.

With 25 autonomous driving trucks and the driverless dockside and terminal cranes put into operation last year, the berth realized full automation in container handling after being upgraded from a traditional one, the first of its kind in the world.