The primary enforcement tool will be intensified monitoring of how foreign shipping firms set their rates, the official newspaper said, quoting comments by a top transport official.

In the past, companies were only required to report a range of potential rates on offer, but they will now be required to report their exact rates to officials.

Every change in rates offered must also be reported and will be subject to "market supervision" by regulators, the report said.

The move comes amid a seven-year-long shipping industry slump, which has punished Chinese shipyards and shipowners and wounded the nation's largest state-owned shipper China COSCO Holdings, which logged significant losses for a second year in a row in 2012.

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