Under a multimodal transportation contract, the cargoes must
be placed in the containers and carried by different means of transport, such as ships, railway wagons or aircraft, from their place of departure to place of destination, without being
unpacked for sorting or verification when being transferred from one mode of transportation to another. If any loss of, or damage to the goods occur, it would be better for cargo interests if they could pursue one single operator who is responsible for the entire transport, rather than have to pursue several carriers involved.
Both the Chinese Maritime Code and the Contract Law contain express provisions for multimodal transport contracts. According to Article 103 of the Maritime Code, the liability of a multimodal transport operator, who is the person directly or indirectly making a multimodal transport contract with the shipper (Maritime Code, Article 102) covers “the period from the time he takes the goods in his charge to the time of their delivery”. Although a multimodal trans- port operator may enter into separate contracts with the carriers for different sections of the whole transport, the liability of the multimodal transport operator for the entire transport will remain unaffected (Maritime Code, Article 104). A shipping line issuing