[Digest] Study presentation: Chinese Investments in European Maritime Infrastructure

The presentation of the study on ‘Chinese investments in European maritime infrastructure’ took place on 26 October 2023 and focused on the following topics:

•  Overview of China’s investments in European maritime infrastructure and specificities of Chinese direct investments;
• Risk assessment over five dimensions: EU-level dependency risk; individual dependency; coercion and/or influence risk; cyber/data risk; and hard security risk;
• Case studies on three strategic European maritime infrastructures.

The presentation looked at the way China’s leading investors in European ports develop their integrated value chain. It provided expert input feeding the debate on the ongoing own-initiative report “on the building a comprehensive European port strategy” (2023/2059(INI)). The presentation was followed by questions from the Members and a stimulating debate where the challenges of ensuring an EU-China level playing field , cyber security risks in maritime infrastructures, and the Europeanisation of the screening of inbound investments were discussed.