South Korea tops shipbuilding order volume in May

South Korean shipbuilders took back the top spot from China in the world market in May, winning nearly half of total global orders.

Korean companies won 1.2 million compensated gross tonnage (CGT) in shipbuilding orders during the month, which accounted for 48 percent of the total global ship orders of 2.5 million CGT, according to the UK-based Clarkson Research Services on Tuesday. 

China came second with 0.84 million CGT, while Japan was in third place with 0.42 million CGT.

CGT is a unit to provide a common yardstick to measure the relative output of merchant shipbuilding activity among different countries and companies.

China suffered from shipyard shutdowns due to the recent COVID-19 lockdown in Shanghai.

Between January and May, Korea won 7.34 million CGT orders, taking up 45 percent of the total orders of 16.25 million CGT placed worldwide. The country’s proportion grew by 9 percentage points over a year, while China went down a notch with 7.16 million CGT.

This is the first time in four years that Korea has outpaced China in accumulated order volume in the same period.

Market watchers attributed the rise to Korean companies’ competitive edge over their rivals in high value-added vessels, liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers and large-scale container ships.

Net orders across the world went down by 17 percent in May, compared to the previous month. In terms of vessel types, orders for large-scale LNG carriers of 140,000 cubic meters or over increased, while those for large-scale container vessels of 12,000 six-meter equivalent units or over, oil tankers, and bulk carriers were reduced.

By Lim Jae-Seong (forestjs@heraldcorp.com)