Insurance companies aim to form a shipping insurance association by year-end in Shanghai, part of the city's master plan for becoming a global financial and logistics center, an official said.

"It's very difficult to develop international trade without insurance. You have to insure the ship before it hits the water and navigates, and international cargo should be insured, too, before leaving," Pei Guang, head of the Shanghai bureau of the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, told a forum on Sunday.

Pei said that although China's international trade has grown rapidly in recent years, its insurance sector has lagged and doesn't meet the needs of the world's second-largest economy.