Price leverage based optimization of anchorage resource allocation in upstream harbor district of Yangtze River

This paper investigates the allocation of anchorage resource in upstream harbour district of Yangtze River from the perspective of price leverage. Anchorage is often referred to the area for the vessel to anchor before loading/unloading operation at the dock. As a public resource, anchorage has a properties of "non-exclusive" and "non-compete". Traditional management methods of anchorage mainly rely on the maritime regulatory agencies, which often at lower efficiency. In this paper, it introduces an economical method for the process of anchorage allocation. The research on allocating the anchorage resource in terms of market mechanisms focus on resolving the management problem of anchorage resource by price leverage. Firstly we analyse the economic properties of anchorage resources as common resource; then the presented work explores the method to adjust the anchorage resources by market mechanism, especially the price leverage. By comparing the public administration and market approach in terms of efficiency, cost and flexibility, this paper proposed a scheme to set the pricing strategy for different anchorage areas with consideration of the distance, anchoring conditions and safety level. The study shows that using price leverage to regulate the allocation of anchorage resources is practically significant in upstream harbour district of Yangtze River.