More than 11,600 ships are piloted in Zhoushan, a year-on-year increase of 8.5 percent. [Photo/WeChat account: china-zjftz]

More than 11,600 ships were piloted in Zhoushan, East China's Zhejiang province, in 2020, a year-on-year increase of 8.5 percent, according to statistics from the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Transportation.

These piloted ships weighed 700 million metric tons, a 9.2 percent year-on-year increase. The number of piloted ships in the city has been on the rise over the past four years with an annual growth rate of 7.4 percent.

Last year, 5,530 production ships, including 1,894 oil product carriers, were piloted in the city, a year-on-year increase of 15.1 percent. The 50,000-ton Guishan channel and 100,000-ton Guanmen channel were also officially put into operation.

In addition, 502 ships that needed to be refueled with bonded bunker oil were piloted.

Zhoushan also reduced pilotage fees by 5.88 million yuan ($908,000) last year, which promoted the rapid development of the bonded oil filing business in the city.