Vessel orders decrease by 34.6% by third quarter this year

The domestic shipbuilding industry suffered from drastic vessel order decreases up to the third quarter of this year compared with same period of last year, said the KSA.

The Korea Shipbuilder's Association (KSA) revealed on October 19 that orders fell 34.6 % to 5.65 million CGT by the third quarter this year from the 8.65 million CGT during the same period last year. Vessels numbers decreased by 92 from 257 to 165.

However, completed vessels recorded 5.11 million CGT, an increase of 1.2% from 4.6 million CGT in the same period of last year.

"As the shipbuilding industry received record high orders last year, ship owners didn't actively pursue vessel orders. That is really hurting now because actually getting orders is much more difficult as buyers have been scared off by economic uncertainties resulting from the recent US Afghanistan situation," explained the association.

The KSA, however, expected that as the industry sustained 680 thousand CGT on a monthly basis, it would be able to accomplish this year's goals, despite the drop in orders.

LNG carriers, high-value vessels, increased to 18 from 5 during a year, indicating a turn-around in the ship building industry. There still remains 16.80 million CGT of work leftover, enough for two and half years.

Looking to the future of ship orders, an official at the KSA said that as the whole shipbuilding industry is focusing on European ship owners, would be no serious effects from the US attacks on Afghanistan."