2025-04-10
At the 23rd China Japan Korea Europe America (JECKU) Shipbuilding Experts Preparatory Meeting held recently, the Japan Shipbuilding Industry Association (SA) pointed out that the current global shipbuilding capacity is about 60 million corrected total tons, while the market demand is only 30 million corrected total tons, and the contradiction of overcapacity is still severe. According to SAJ's prediction, the global shipbuilding market demand will experience another large-scale growth from 2025 to 2035, and is expected to reach supply-demand balance by 2030-2035. Experts have stated that after the outbreak of the international financial crisis, global new ship orders have significantly decreased, and major shipbuilding countries in the world have been reducing their production capacity in recent years. If this factor is taken into account, and with the growth of global maritime trade volume, the time point for the global shipbuilding market to reach supply-demand balance may be advanced.
This ECKU shipbuilding expert pre supervision meeting conducted in-depth exchanges and discussions on the current economic situation, overall development trend, typical ship type market status, shipbuilding capacity supply and demand situation, shipbuilding costs of various countries, and environmental issues faced by the world shipbuilding industry. Han Guang, Deputy Chief Engineer of the Economic Research Center of China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation, who was invited to attend the conference, told reporters that although industry experts from various countries have put forward different views on some specific issues, they generally express optimism about the prospects of the global shipbuilding market and believe that future market demand growth is the trend.
In the future, with the development of the global economy, the volume of international maritime trade will steadily increase. According to SAJ's prediction, this data will reach 11.65 billion tons by 2020 and 16.31 billion tons by 2035. Driven by this, the demand in the international shipbuilding market is expected to increase from 2020, and the growth rate is expected to recover to the level of 2000-2010 from 2025 to 2035. By 2030-2035, it is expected to reach 60 million corrected total tons. The representative from SAU pointed out that from the current perspective, the contradiction of overcapacity will continue to affect most shipbuilding enterprises until 2020. Due to insufficient market demand, most of the orders undertaken by shipping companies during this period were low-priced ship orders. It is worth mentioning that many shipping companies are actively taking measures to cope with market weakness, such as developing more energy-efficient and environmentally friendly ship types, entering the fields of marine engineering equipment and offshore wind power. These practices should continue, while strengthening the analysis and prediction of the shipbuilding market to provide reference for the development of enterprises The representative from SAU said.
According to the forecast of Simpson Shipping Consulting (SSV) in the UK, there will be a significant increase in demand for the global shipbuilding market starting from 2020. Experts from the European Association of Ships and Maritime Equipment (SEA) have stated that global economic integration has driven the growth of world maritime trade volume. While alleviating the contradiction of overcapacity demand in the shipping market, it has also brought about some demand for new ships. Meanwhile, due to a significant decrease in new ship orders, major shipbuilding countries around the world have been reducing their production capacity in recent years, which is conducive to the sustained and healthy development of the shipbuilding industry. The latest statistics from Clarkson Research UK show that compared to 2012, China's shipbuilding capacity has decreased by about 11%, Japan by about 14%, South Korea by about 3%, and European countries by about 17%.
According to statistics, in the past 17 years, the global average annual new ship order volume was 37.6 million corrected total tons. According to Clarkson's forecast, the global average annual new ship orders from 2016 to 2023 will be 47.9 million corrected total tons. By 2019, global shipbuilding capacity will be reduced to 51.7 million corrected total tons. Representatives from the Korea Shipbuilding Association (KOSHIPA) believe that due to the continuous compression of shipbuilding capacity in many countries and the expected increase in demand for new ships, the international shipbuilding market will see a turnaround starting from 2016.
Although the overall demand in the international shipbuilding market is showing an increasing trend, the growth rate will vary among different ship types. Han Guang stated that overall, the demand growth rate of the three mainstream ship types, namely bulk carriers, oil tankers, and container ships, will be slower in the future. However, due to their large market size, they still dominate the international shipbuilding market. In terms of bulk carriers, according to SAl's forecast, the global bulk shipping volume will maintain a growth rate of 2.1% from 2012 to 2035, reaching 6 billion tons by 2035, corresponding to a capacity demand of 889 million deadweight tons, which will add nearly 200 million deadweight tons of capacity demand compared to the current level. In terms of oil tankers, by 2035, the global crude oil shipping volume will reach 3.75 billion tons, corresponding to a capacity demand of 620 million deadweight tons, which will increase the capacity demand by 120 million deadweight tons compared to the current level. In terms of container ships, by 2035, the global container shipping volume will reach 550 million TEUs, corresponding to a capacity demand of 39.7 million TEUs, which will increase the capacity demand by 23 million TEUs compared to the current level.
From this meeting, it can be seen that green environmental protection is currently the focus of attention in the global shipbuilding industry. Representatives generally believe that in order to minimize the pollution of ships to the marine environment and atmosphere, and meet the new rules and regulations issued and implemented by the International Maritime Organization and related agencies, shipbuilding companies need to be committed to developing more environmentally friendly ship types. "Han Guang said that for Chinese shipbuilding companies, this is both an opportunity and a challenge. Chinese shipping companies should make more efforts to improve green ship construction technology and the intelligence level of ships, and focus on enhancing their competitiveness, in order to occupy the market high ground and obtain more new ship orders when the international shipping market truly recovers.
