Bao Yugang, a descendant of Bao Zheng: Became the world's shipping king from scratch and donated huge sums of money many times to support the development of the mainland.

"There is a Bao Qingtian in Kaifeng, who defends loyalty and treachery without mercy."

This is an episode from the TV series "Bao Qingtian", which sings about the selflessness and uprightness of Bao Zheng, a famous official in the Northern Song Dynasty. character. In addition to his official career, Bao Zheng was also a filial son.

Bao Zheng was born in 999 AD. He passed the Jinshi examination in 1027, was appointed as a Dali judge, and served as the magistrate of Jianchang County. Bao Zheng considered that his parents were old and in order to take care of them conveniently, he requested to find a job near Hefei. The superiors also realized Bao Zheng's difficulties and approved his request, and he was reassigned to be a state tax supervisor. But his parents didn't want him to leave, so Bao Zheng decided to resign and go home to support his parents.

A few years later, his parents died one after another, and Bao Zheng built a thatched cottage next to his parents' tombs to mourn them. Until the mourning period was over, he couldn't bear to leave. His relatives and neighbors came to comfort and encourage him many times, and then Bao Zheng went out to be an official again.

If you behave like this, you will naturally do well. After Bao Zheng became an official, he was honest, upright, and enforced the law impartially. He became a famous official of the previous generation in Chinese history and has been passed down through the ages.

In 1918, Bao Yugang, the 29th generation grandson of Bao Zheng, was born in Ningbo, and he became the world-famous "shipping king". The reason why Pao Yugang's career has achieved such great success mainly depends on his personal talent and quality. His superhuman talent and character were cultivated from an early age and were inseparable from his father's teachings.

Bao Yugang's father is called Bao Zhaolong. He is amiable, fair and upright in nature. He is worthy of being the descendant of Bao Zheng, a famous official in the Northern Song Dynasty. Bao Yugang's personality is very similar to his father.

When Bao Yugang was very young, his father repeatedly warned them: "A person's reputation and credibility are the most important and fundamental things in life. People living in this world must never get ill-gotten gains. Take it." For this reason, his father told them stories about Pao Yugang's great-grandfather many times.

Pao Yugang’s great-grandfather practiced medicine in his early years and supported his family. Later, in order to let his family live a better life, he transformed into a silk trading business. Once he went out on business and stayed in a hotel. The next day he carried his luggage with the hired porter. It was not until he stayed at another hotel that night that he discovered that there was a bag of luggage that was not his own.

So, he quickly asked the porter: "Why did you pick up other people's luggage?" The porter quickly explained: "How did I know this was not yours? There was only this one load of luggage left in the guest room at that time. "

In order to find the owner of the lost luggage, Bao Yugang's great-grandfather opened the luggage and checked it. He found that there was a money order for 5,000 taels of silver and another 200 taels of silver, but no address was found. In order to return it to the owner, he decided to return to the original hotel, but he waited there for three days and no one came to claim it. So, I had no choice but to leave a notice on the wall of the hotel and the address where to collect the lost items, and then I left.

In the second year, the original owner checked into the hotel again and found the notice on the wall. He was a little unbelievable, but decided to send someone to investigate, and the missing person was actually found. luggage. When the owner came to claim it, he offered two hundred taels of silver as a reward, but was rejected by Bao Yugang's great-grandfather.

He refused: "These are not my things, of course I can't take them. This is the fundamental of being a human being. How can I thank you again."

Seeing the other party's integrity And keeping his promise, the owner was moved by the other party. The owner was engaged in timber business on a relatively large scale. When he saw that the Bao family was not wealthy, he invited Bao Yugang's great-grandfather to run the timber business together. After more than ten years of hard work, the Bao family gradually became wealthy and built a new house, and Bao Yugang was born in this new house.

Father Bao Zhaolong told Bao Yugang the story of his great-grandfather’s innocent life, which left a deep imprint on his mind. And the teachings his father gave him on his way of growing up were something he would never forget.

Bao Yugang’s father, Bao Zhaolong, is engaged in business, and his family conditions are relatively good, so Bao Yugang can also receive a better education. When Bao Yugang was 13 years old, his father sent him to Shanghai to study. Having been interested in the sea since he was a child, he chose to study at Wusong Merchant Marine College.

After the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, he moved to Chongqing and worked in a bank. Because of his hard work at work, he rose from an ordinary clerk to the manager of the Chongqing branch. After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, he returned to Shanghai and became the business manager of Shanghai Bank before the age of 30, and was later promoted to deputy general manager.

This experience in the financial industry allowed him to accumulate a wealth of financial knowledge and see a variety of business techniques, which will be of great help to his future career development.

In early 1949, the artillery fire of the Liberation War approached Shanghai. Many wealthy people in Shanghai packed up their belongings and moved overseas to Hong Kong and Taiwan. Pao Yugang also resigned from his position as deputy general manager of the bank, and then went to Hong Kong with his father to start a career in the world with 100,000 yuan saved.

After some planning, the father and son rented an office and started import and export trade, engaging in the trade of local products from the mainland. The business was not bad. In 1955, when the import and export trade was blocked, Bao Zhaolong prepared to transform into real estate development, but Bao Yugang and his father had different ideas.

When he was a child, his father often took Yugang Pao to the beach to watch the sea. The merchant ships coming and going on the sea left a deep impression on Yugang Bao. Since then, Bao Yugang has determined to work in the shipping industry when he grows up. When Bao Yugang was 13 years old, he went to Shanghai to study and chose the shipping industry, which coincided with his childhood dream.

When Pao Yugang chose to engage in shipping, his family did not understand it at first, because the shipping industry in Hong Kong was already very developed, and Pao Yugang was a layman and knew little about the shipping industry. In order to realize his dream, Bao Yugang persuaded his family, collected and learned about ships and shipping, and carefully read books on shipping and ships.

After that, he obtained the support of his father, and with the help of his friends, he raised US$700,000 in funds and made a special trip to buy back a second-hand coal-burning cargo ship from the UK. From this, his global shipping company set sail.

Although the old ship he bought was 28 years old and had a displacement of only 8,200 tons, he was extremely happy when he boarded the deck of the ship. He touched around and looked around. Look, like a father looking at his newborn son. At this moment, he had secretly made up his mind: he must become a true world shipping king.

At that time, most of the shipping kings in the world and Hong Kong adopted the short-term rental model, which not only charged high fees, but also allowed the rental price to be increased at any time. However, Bao Yugang chose a different method from them, that is, long-term leasing. He signed a three-year, five-year or longer lease with the party using the vessel, and the lessor paid the rent monthly. In this way, although the rental price is lower, long-term orders can be locked in.

In Bao Yugang’s view, in order to achieve stable development, one must reduce risks and the other must establish credibility in the industry. By leasing the ship to a shipping company for operation, you can earn a stable monthly income, which undoubtedly minimizes your risk. And through long-term rental, we gradually establish credibility in the industry, so there will be more and more customers.

In the second year after Bao Yugang entered the shipping industry, the Suez Canal was closed due to the war in the Middle East, causing shipping freight to skyrocket. Over a period of time, the second-hand boat he purchased earned him the money to buy seven new boats.

In the 1960s, Bao Yugang keenly observed that with the development of oil fields in the Middle East, the oil transportation industry would occupy an important position in the global shipping industry. So he quickly invested money to build large oil tankers, and because he was one step ahead, he made a lot of money.

In 1977, the size of Bao Yugang’s fleet reached 13.47 million tons, 7.53 million tons more than the second-ranked Japanese shipping king Sanguang, and nearly 10 million more than the Greek shipping king Onassis. ton. By the early 1980s, Bao Yugang's fleet reached 20 million tons, becoming a veritable "world shipping king."

When Bao Yugang secured his throne as the "World Shipping King", he keenly observed that the world shipping industry was about to fall into recession, so he made a decision that surprised many people, that is, to sell Abandoned most of the ships, began to abandon ships and land, and transformed into other industries.

In the first battle, Yugang Pao won the equity of the British-owned enterprise "Wharf" 49, in the second battle he acquired the equity of the British-owned Wheelock 34 for HK$2.5 billion, and in 1986 he acquired Standard Chartered Bank 14.5 shares. After acquiring the above-mentioned assets, Pao Yukang's influence in Hong Kong and the international business community can be said to be a powerful influence.

Although Pao Yugang has hundreds of millions of assets in Hong Kong, he has not forgotten his father's teachings: "When a leaf falls and returns to its roots, it is necessary to care about the cause of your hometown." He is very filial to his father, and naturally he does not care about his father's entrustment. Dare to neglect, but with the spring breeze of reform and opening up, Bao Yugang saw the opportunity to serve his motherland and hometown.

So, he wrote a letter to the relevant departments in the mainland, saying that he would come back to visit relatives, because he learned that his cousin Lu Xuzhang was the director of the National Tourism Administration, which would give him an opportunity to visit relatives. This letter was quickly sent to Deng Xiaoping, who immediately instructed Liao Chengzhi to send an invitation telegram: Welcome Pao Yugang and his wife to come back to visit relatives.

In November 1978, Pao Yugang, who had been away from the mainland for 30 years, finally came back and wanted to see how much the motherland had changed in the past thirty years. When they arrived in Beijing, they encountered an embarrassing thing, that is, they could not find a decent hotel. Therefore, Bao Yugang immediately decided to donate 10 million US dollars to the motherland, build a modern tourist hotel, and introduce internationally advanced hotel management methods.

He told his cousin Lu Xuzhang, who was the director of the National Tourism Administration at the time, about this intention, and said that after completion, the property rights and operating rights of the hotel would belong to the state. He only had one request, and that was to name the hotel after his father - Zhaolong Hotel.

The reason why Pao Yugang named it Zhaolong Hotel was also to fulfill his filial piety to his father. We know that Bao Zheng is a very filial man who would rather resign in order to support his parents. As the 29th generation grandson of Bao Zheng, Bao Yugang naturally inherited the good qualities of the Bao family.

However, in the past, we assisted other countries and generally did not accept "foreign aid." We didn't know what to do with the US$10 million in aid funds. So after Lu Xuzhang asked Deng Xiaoping for instructions, Deng Xiaoping decided to personally receive the donation and build the Zhaolong Hotel by the Changhong Bridge on the East Third Ring Road in Beijing.

What surprised Pao Yugang was that on the day Zhaolong Hotel was completed, Deng Xiaoping personally attended the opening ceremony and inscribed the name of the restaurant.

Since Pao Yugang came back to visit relatives for the first time, he has been very generous in donating to the mainland and his hometown. In addition to donating the Zhaolong Hotel, he also donated 10 million US dollars to build a large-scale and advanced facility at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Zhaolong Library.

In 1984, Deng Xiaoping gave instructions to mobilize all the "Ningbo Gang" from all over the world to build Ningbo. This deeply moved a group of overseas "Ningbo Gang" people including Bao Yugang. This further inspired their enthusiasm to come back to support the construction of their hometown.

On October 28, 1984, Pao Yugang’s family returned to his hometown of Ningbo after an absence of more than 30 years. When he learned that Ningbo did not have a university, he said: “Ningbo’s area is 10 times that of Hong Kong. , the population is similar to that of Hong Kong, but there is no comprehensive university. How can we do it while the country is marching towards the four modernizations? "So, he immediately decided to donate 20 million US dollars to establish Ningbo University.

Led by Bao Yugang and others, a large number of overseas "Ningbo Gang" people came back to build their hometown, driving the development of Ningbo.

In addition to investing in the construction of his hometown, Pao also actively promoted the return of Hong Kong. Pao not only has frequent contacts with high-level officials in the mainland, but also maintains a good personal relationship with former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Every time he visits London, he has lunch and talks with the Iron Lady.

In 1981, Pao Yugang and his family came to No. 10 Downing Street again to visit Mrs. Thatcher and brought two mysterious gifts to Mrs. Thatcher: one was a skipping rope. In order to bring the two of them closer, Mrs. Thatcher was really amused when she opened the gift; another gift was that Pao Yugang ordered two ships from a British shipyard, which was very important to the sluggish British shipbuilding industry at that time. This is good news for the industry, and it undoubtedly expresses her sincerity to Mrs. Thatcher.

Pao Yugang sincerely expressed the hope that Mrs. Thatcher could participate in the tailoring of this ship and another sister ship built in Shanghai, and approach China in an unofficial way to experience China's reforms. Open results. Afterwards, Pao Yugang quickly conveyed the news to China, and China issued a formal invitation to Mrs. Thatcher, thus facilitating formal contacts between the two countries. Since then, Pao Yugang often traveled between Hong Kong and Beijing, making great contributions to the smooth return of Hong Kong.

In 1987, Bai Yugang announced his retirement and handed over the management of his companies to his four sons-in-law, while he devoted more time to the construction of the mainland. However, just as he was preparing to do more for the motherland, he died suddenly of cerebral hemorrhage on September 23, 1991, at the age of 73.

As the 29th generation grandson of Bao Zheng, Bao Yugang not only inherited Bao Zheng’s uprightness, selflessness, filial piety and other fine qualities, but also carried forward these fine traditions. He is indeed an admirable world shipping king and a Chinese pioneer.