China (Shanghai) International Boat Show – needs water.

by Guy Nowell, Sail-World Asia on 13 Apr 2010 Sunday was the last day of Asia’s longest established international boat show. CIBS 2010, held at the Shanghai Exhibition Centre, was sold out to exhibitors months before the event, and over 400 domestic and international brands were on hand to bring boating to an eager Chinese population.

The show is a combination of pleasure boating and trade. Over half the exhibitors are boats dealers and brokers, with boating equipment and accessories, hardware manufacturers and product agents making up the rest. Luxury and Iifestyle products were also strongly featured at this year’s show, with Remy Martin’s Louis XIII cognac as the Official Sponsors, and Porsche coming in as an Associate Sponsor. The Four Seasons Shanghai was the Official Hotel for the event, and venue for the inaugural Asian Marine & Boating Awards.

The show has been strongly supported over the years by the top international yachting brands which include Group Bénéteau, the nine brands of The Ferretti Group, Azimut-Benetti Group, Brunswick, Sunseeker, Princess and Fairline, as well as the domestic giants Shanghai Double Happiness, Changzhou FRP, Wuxi Dongfang, Zhuhai Sunbird, Zhuhai Jianglong, Xiamen Hansheng, Shanghai Yihong, Foshan Poly, Guangzhou Minhua, Qingdao Nauticsta, to name a few.

This year saw a number of new faces including Ocean Alexander Marine, a Taiwan manufacturer participating in CIBS for the first time. The group is also the exclusive supplier of VIP shuttle boats for 2010 Shanghai World Expo, which starts in May 2010. Taiwan yacht brand Shing Sheng Fa Boat diplayed their models of workboats, and Jiangsu Xinsheng, who focus on fishing boats, displayed their latest designs produced from imported moulds from New Zealand. Other newcomers to the show included the French powerboat builder Couach, and Italian brand Cantieri Navali Reali.

National pavilions were more active this year and provided the perfect warm-up for the 2010 Shanghai World Expo.

The Australian Pavilion continued its participation, while the New Zealanders returned to CIBS after a two-year absence. The Italian Pavilion dominated the show this year with many of the luxury brands looking for Chinese partners or opportunities for cooperation within the developing pleasure boating market in China.

Many exhibitors expressed the opinion that there were fewer visitors to the Show this year than in 2009, but that the ‘quality’ of those visitors was better. 'Five years ago we were being asked where the life jackets were stored,' one motor yacht dealer told us. 'Now we are being asked about power trains and fuel range. That’s progress.'

And it is quite possible that the mix of exhibitors themselves has matured as well… only a couple of years ago there was an influx of overseas names, attracted by the infinite promise of a market of 1.2 billion people, all queuing up to buy a boat of some sort.

Many of them did not return. But there are boat manufacturers and brands at CIBS that are in the arena for the long term. Most of them agree that the marine leisure market has still not ‘taken off’ (in spite of what some of the so-called ‘researchers’ like to say), and that anything like a market is at least five years away.

Three things are needed – still – before ‘boating’ takes off in China in big numbers. They are: a population with an inclination to go boating; facilities and infrastructure to actually allow boating to happen; and a clear and coherent set of Government regulations recognising pleasure/leisure vessels as an entity in their own right.

For now, the numerous and grandiose ‘marina’ and ‘yacht club’ schemes are for the most part really only property developments with a nautical lifestyle ‘hook’ to make the brochure and the architectural model look good. Boat parks, if you will. The actual number of properly equipped operational marinas in China is really very small. You certainly wouldn’t have to take off your socks to count them. In fact, as far as we know, the only marina in China with a travel hoist is the Qingdao Olympic Marina.

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If CIBS is not to gradually become entirely a trade show, what it desperately needs is WATER. But that’s a tricky call when the nearest available is the very muddy and tidal Huangpu River that flows through the middle of Shanghai – very, very fast, both in and out. Really, a marina in the heart of Shanghai would require a basin off the main river and away from the flow. Of course, anything’s possible.

This is the last year that the show will be staged amidst the faded grandeur of the historical and once-graceful Shanghai Exhibition Center. After the World Expo, CIBS will move to the Expo Garden, which is a brand new modern venue to cater for exhibitors at CIBS 2011. 'As the longest-established and largest boat show in Asia we are all excited to head for another brand new journey and provide an attractive venue with brand new facilities to our exhibitors,' said

For 2010, the official on-water display venue, Shanghai Yacht Club, hosted eight luxury yachts at their (currently) very small facility just upstream from The Bund. This downtown ‘marina’ has a very long way to go before it becomes an attractive option for boat owners – but things do happen fast in China.

At the moment, any international yacht visitor is likely to be put off by the berthing facilities available, and the colour of the river. One industry professional confided that he had been asked by a European yacht owner to ‘check out’ Shanghai, and advised his client that if he brought a boat here, 'he’d have to throw away all the fenders afterwards.'

CIBS is organised by the Shanghai Association of Shipbuilding Industry, China Boat Industry & Trade Association, Shanghai UBM Sinoexpo International Exhibition Co, and Shanghai Centre for Scientific & Technology Exchange with Foreign Countries.

For further information, see www.boatshowchina.com