韩中货物多式联运相关法律体系及问题的考察

Abstract

With the “Belt and Road” Initiative and the signing of the Free Trade Agreement, Korea and China will continue to enter a new phase of economic and trade cooperation. In fact, even under the impact of COVID-19, the total volume of imports and exports between the two countries has been able to grow despite the difficulties. According to data from China’s General Administration of Customs in October 2020, the import and export trade between the two countries had reached RMB 1.45 trillion in the first three quarters of the same year, an increase of 1.1% year-on-year against the backdrop of the global economic downturn. The economic development is complemented by the demand for a more efficient and convenient logistics system in order to secure the results and continuously expand the market. As an important part of the so-called “comprehensive system of transport”, multimodal transport of cargoes, which is an integrated and efficient “door to door” mode, can undoubtedly become a “strong force” in the field of cargo transportation, as traditional unimodal transport is no longer able to meet all the needs of trade between the two countries. In order to vigorously develop multimodal transportation of cargoes, many shipping countries have increased the legislation on multimodal transportation of cargoes in accordance with various international conventions. Both Korea and China have the ambitious goal of building a “maritime power”, but they are somewhat conservative in the legislation related to multimodal transportation. The different political systems and cultural backgrounds of the two countries have led to some differences in legislation. Both sides also lack a certain degree of understanding of each other’s legal systems. Because of this, it is meaningful and necessary to sort out the legal systems of multimodal transport in both countries. In particular, the Korean legislation on multimodal transport and its various transport sections are distributed in various chapters of the Commercial Code. The 2010 Commercial Law Reform Bill, which regulates multimodal transportation, is still at the study stage and has not been passed by the Korean National Assembly. China’s legislation on multimodal transportation of goods and its various transport sections are scattered in the Civil Code, the Maritime Code and the laws and regulations on unimodal transportation, forming a loose legal system of multimodal transportation. There is a strong demand for the development of multimodal transportation of cargoes. The number of disputes on international multimodal transportation of goods between two countries is also expected to increase. However, after examining the relevant laws and regulations, it is easy to see that the existing legal system is inadequate to meet the increasing challenges due to partial deficiencies in the face of a new situation that may become increasingly complex. A prerequisite for solving the problem is to identify it. By means of “comparative law studies” to find the similarities and differences between the two countries’ legislation, Korea and China have both their own problems and legal dilemmas that need to be overcome jointly in terms of multimodal transport-related regulations. If this series of legal system deficiencies can be effectively improved, it can make a non-negligible contribution to the development of multimodal transportation of goods within the two countries, especially between the two countries, and even the entire integrated transport system. In addition, taking into account that the two countries must give priority to their own national conditions and the actual needs of their respective multimodal transport development in the formulation of domestic laws and regulations, the two countries will make targeted complements. Therefore, in the development of international intermodal transportation of goods between the two countries, based on the basis of mutual trust and mutual benefit and win-win cooperation of the “Korea-China Free Trade Agreement”, a “Korea-China Multimodal Transportation Agreement” with the same regional nature can be formulated. The “agreement” will effectively harmonize the differences in legislation between the two countries and cover all the systems that should be involved in order to promote the legal construction of multimodal transportation of goods between Korea and China.