Mitsui OSK Lines has hit a snag in its plans to set up a liaison office at Ningbo in China's Zhejiang province.
A company spokesman confirmed that the office - due to open last month - had not yet been set up. He declined to comment further.
Minoru Kawabata, Mitsui OSK's director and chief executive for Asia, said two months ago that the office was being established because the area was expanding rapidly.
Separately, president Masaharu Ikuta said he was expecting growth of about 15 per cent in the company's container business in China.
He said the company, which has a branch office in Shanghai, was seeing increasing business volumes.
Mitsui had 10 liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers under construction in Japan which would be used to transport six million tonnes of gas annually, Mr Ikuta said.
