In 1405, China’s ocean-going fleet attracted attention. This huge fleet, led by Zheng He, consisted of more than 260 ships, carrying more than 20,000 people, sailing more than 130,000 nautical miles, and sailing to more than 30 countries and regions along the way. Spread the glory and dream of the Chinese Emperor.
87 years later, the West made its first voyage. With the funding of the Queen of Spain, Columbus led three small caravels and 87 people to pursue the mysterious "Chinese Kingdom" (i.e. China) in Marco Polo's travels, because there was the King of Kings there.
But in modern times, the glory of China's shipbuilding industry has disappeared. However, there are signs that China has a chance to restore its maritime glory.
National Oil, National Transport, National Shipbuilding, and National Construction
Not long ago, the OECD Shipbuilding Working Group, an authoritative organization in the world's shipbuilding industry, estimated that China's shipbuilding completion volume is expected to exceed 8 million deadweight tons this year, reaching the world market With a share of 15%, it will exceed 10 million deadweight tons in 2005, reaching 18% of the world market share.
As early as 2003, China's shipbuilding completion volume accounted for 11.8% of the world's share, breaking through the 5% to 7% of the world's market share that China's shipbuilding industry had occupied in the past 10 years.
“At present, the shipbuilding industry is the only industry among my country’s heavy processing industries that can be at the forefront of the world and compete with the world’s advanced levels.” Some experts believe that the shipbuilding industry is labor-intensive, capital-intensive, and technology-intensive. industry. Compared with developed countries, China's labor costs are low; compared with other developing countries, China's technology, capital and industrial foundation are relatively strong. “We have comprehensive advantages that advanced and underdeveloped countries cannot possess at the same time.”
Although not known to most people, the comprehensive advantages of China's shipbuilding industry have been reflected: in 1995, China's shipbuilding output surpassed Germany for the first time, accounting for 5% of the world market share, ranking behind South Korea and Japan. It is the third largest shipbuilding country in the world and has maintained this ranking to this day.
In fact, the boom of China's shipbuilding industry is largely due to the rapid development of its own economy. Historical experience shows that the revitalization of a country's shipbuilding industry is often completed during the period of economic take-off and a sharp increase in trade in goods. Therefore, Japan was able to completely surpass Europe in the middle of the last century and become the new center of world shipbuilding, while South Korea began to surpass Japan in the 1990s and became the new darling of the world's shipbuilding industry in the early 21st century.
This year, statistical results released by the World Trade Organization show that China's world ranking of import and export of goods in 2003 has risen from fifth place in the previous year to fourth place. According to China Customs statistics, in 2003, China's import and export of goods reached US$851.2 billion, an increase of 37.1% over the previous year. Among them, exports were US$438.4 billion, an increase of 34.6%; imports were US$412.8 billion, an increase of 39.9%.
As an important strategic buyer of the world’s energy and raw materials, the growth of China’s import and export trade has significantly affected the trend of the international shipping industry. In the past two years, dry bulk cargo traffic, which accounts for half of the world's maritime transport, has increased by about 48%, mainly because China imports large amounts of raw materials such as iron ore; at the same time, China's annual container throughput has also ranked first in the world.
In another bulk maritime transportation business, crude oil transportation, China’s imported oil accounts for about 1/3 of the world’s total tanker capacity. This year, China's annual crude oil imports exceeded 100 million tons for the first time, and its dependence on foreign crude oil has approached 40%. Among them, more than 90% of imported oil needs to be shipped by sea.
But what is worrying is that 90% of China's imported oil shipped by sea is borne by foreign ships, thus making China's oil security subject to others.
Currently, China mostly imports oil from the Middle East and Africa. The Strait of Malacca, the Strait of Hormuz, and the Cape of Good Hope are the choke points for China’s shipping. But China’s control over these maritime areas is very limited.
It is reported that in the US military’s new anti-terrorism plan called the "Regional Maritime Security Plan", the United States will dispatch Marines and special forces to the Malacca Strait to prevent terrorist attacks and combat weapons proliferation and drug smuggling. and criminal activities such as piracy.
In addition, India has also established an advance base at the western entrance of the Strait of Malacca.
The Indonesian Navy announced that it will deploy warships and fighter aircraft to perform patrol missions in the Strait of Malacca.
“It can be seen from these oil transportation lines that almost all the areas along the way are controlled by potential competitors. If nothing happens, it will be very troublesome.” Institute of Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Ren Haiping, director of the International Strategy Research Office, said.
In Northeast Asia, China and Japan are the world's two major oil importers, and their transportation lines almost overlap. However, because a system to protect the safe transportation of oil was established after World War II, Japan currently faces far fewer oil transportation safety problems than China. The important point is that Japan has always adhered to the strategy of national oil and national transportation. 80% to 90% of its imported oil is transported by its own shipowners and buyers. The voice of "National Petroleum, National Transport, National Shipbuilding, National Manufacturing" began to amplify in China.
Since 2003, relevant national ministries and commissions have held meetings with the three major domestic oil producers and four major domestic oil transporters to discuss the issue of "National Petroleum and National Transportation" and formulated a preliminary "National Petroleum Corporation" "National Transport" development plan: It is planned to build a large-scale ocean shipping fleet capable of transporting 50 million tons of imported crude oil in 2005, a fleet capable of transporting 75 million tons of imported crude oil in 2010, and a fleet capable of transporting 130 million tons of imported crude oil in 2020.
At the same time, in order to support the domestic shipbuilding industry, the state has long encouraged domestic shipowners to build ships in domestic shipyards, and provided financial subsidies of 17% of the ship price to offset the total shipbuilding price. In order to support shipyards in building large oil tankers, the state finance will provide shipyards with fully subsidized loans. Driven by policies, most of the new ships built by domestic shipowners are built in domestic shipyards. China's shipbuilding industry is therefore ambitious.
Recently, the National Development and Reform Commission proposed to build the first shipbuilding country in 2015 and provide preferential treatment and support in taxation, financing and other aspects, taking this as an opportunity to promote the strategic structural adjustment of the shipbuilding industry.
The goal put forward by the Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense is: after 10 to 15 years of development, the comprehensive competitiveness of my country's shipbuilding industry will be close to the level of Japan and South Korea at that time. At the same time, in terms of total shipbuilding volume, ship production reached 10 million deadweight tons in 2005, accounting for about 16% of the world market share; by 2015 it reached 24 million deadweight tons, accounting for 35% of the world market share, reaching the world's largest tonnage level. First.
It is reported that the country has delineated three major shipbuilding bases and concentrated its efforts on the construction of the Bohai Bay, Yangtze River Estuary and Pearl River Estuary. It is hoped that by 2010, a large-scale shipbuilding industry group will be the main body and the three major shipbuilding bases will be formed. The industrial structure is based on the base and coordinates the development of various shipbuilding and supporting enterprises.
The curtain of "National Petroleum and National Transport, National Lunker and National Manufacturing" has suddenly begun.
Space for the shipbuilding industry
Since oil security is one of the reasons for the revitalization of the shipbuilding industry, here we take oil tankers as an example and assume that all crude oil imports in my country will be transported by sea in the future. Completed to analyze the space of China's shipbuilding industry.
According to data, the main reason why domestic shipowners are at an absolute disadvantage in the imported crude oil transportation market is that the ship structure is unreasonable. The profits of international crude oil transportation are relatively low, and the investment in tanker construction is huge, so the economies of scale are very significant. At present, the main ship types for international crude oil transportation are VLCC and ULCC tankers with a deadweight of more than 200,000 tons. Some routes with shorter transportation distances use 150,000-dwt SUEZMAX and 100,000-dwt AFRAMAX tankers.
In contrast, although our country’s fleet ranks third in the world in terms of gross tonnage, its ship structure is unreasonable. As the world's second largest crude oil importer, its tanker tonnage ranks only 13th in the world. What is even more unfavorable is that my country's oil tankers generally have serious problems of small tonnage and long age, which are not suitable for large-scale transportation of imported crude oil.
According to incomplete statistics, my country's oil shipping companies currently have a total capacity of 60,000-ton or above oil tankers carrying imported crude oil totaling 5.18 million deadweight tons. Among them, the number of tankers that can truly be used for long-distance transportation of imported crude oil There are only 21 100,000-ton AFRAMAX tankers, 150,000-ton SUEZMAX tankers and 300,000-ton VLCC tankers, with a total transport capacity of approximately 4.12 million tons. There are currently only about 10 VLCC tankers in the country that truly represent the country’s crude oil transportation capabilities.
In 2002, 49.55% of China's total imported crude oil came from the Middle East, 22.76% from Africa, 10% from Europe and the Western Hemisphere, and 17% from the nearby Asia-Pacific region. Judging from the development trend, due to the gradual increase in oil consumption in Southeast Asia, the proportion of crude oil imported by China from this region in the total imported crude oil will become smaller and smaller in the future. Due to its proximity to China, the Asia-Pacific region can use AFRAMAX tankers. The average transportation distance from the Middle East to China's coastal ports is about 6,000 nautical miles, and the transportation distance from Africa to China's coastal ports is more than 10,000 nautical miles. According to international experience, if the transportation distance of imported crude oil exceeds 6,000 nautical miles, it is most economical to use VLCC or ULCC tankers of more than 200,000 tons for transportation. Therefore, it can be predicted from the geographical distribution of imported crude oil that in the future, China's imported crude oil transportation market will be dominated by VLCC and ULCC tankers, supplemented by a certain number of SUEZMAX and AFRAMAX tankers.
A VLCC with 300,000 deadweight tons or 2 million barrels (approximately 272,000 deadweight tons) is used as the standard unit for calculation, and each ship completes 7 voyages on the Middle East-China route in one year (Full load) (excluding repair and maintenance dates), based on the fact that domestic shipowners’ transportation volume in China’s imported crude oil transportation market reached 25% in 2005, my country will need about 12 VLCCs in 2005. Since 22.76% of my country's crude oil currently comes from more distant Africa, and many of the customers currently developed by my country Merchants Group are still foreign customers, the actual number of VLCCs needed may exceed 15.
According to expert predictions, the proportion of "Petronas and National Transportation" will reach 25% in 2005, increase to 40% in 2010, and increase to 60% in 2020. Correspondingly, my country's demand for the three ship types of VLCC, SUEZMAX and AFRAMAX will reach 35 in 2005, requiring an investment of approximately RMB 15 billion; in 2010, the demand for these three ship types totaled 52 ships, requiring an investment of approximately RMB 23 billion. ; In 2015, these two figures were 97 ships and 43 billion respectively.
At the same time, as the world's shipping industry pays more attention to transportation safety, the scrapping rate of some old ship types has accelerated, which has also brought opportunities for further growth of China's shipbuilding industry.
In 2002, the single-hull oil tanker "Prestige" sank off the coast of Spain, causing one of the most serious ecological disasters in the world's history. More than 4,000 fishermen off the coast of Spain were unable to fish due to pollution of fishery resources. fish, with economic losses amounting to 300 million euros. According to a report by the International Maritime Organization, the Prestige is the fourth Japanese-made single-hull oil tanker to sink in 10 years.
In view of the fact that the accident rate of single-hull oil tankers is five times higher than that of double-hull oil tankers, the European Union has banned single-hull crude oil tankers from docking since October 1, 2003. The 50th meeting of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) Marine Environment Protection Council (MEPC) adopted the amendment to the 73/78 International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL) in early December. It is expected to enter into force on April 5, 2005. All types of single-hull The phase-out time limits for oil tankers are much earlier than the original regulations - the original planned phase-out time was 2007 for the C1 type and 2015 for the C2 type.
According to Nikkan Maritime Communications estimates, if the EU single-hull tanker phase-out rules are followed, the total number of single-hull tankers in the world will be phased out by 2010, reaching 2,100, and the total deadweight tonnage is estimated to reach 137.892 million tons.
According to data, due to strong domestic and foreign demand, the world shipbuilding market demand is promising in the next 10 to 20 years. It is predicted that the global average annual demand for new ships from 2006 to 2015 will be around 50 million deadweight tons, which is more than 20% higher than the average annual production in the past 10 years. The demand for the three main ship types (bulk cargo, container, oil) is strong. In the next 10 years, my country's annual average demand for new ships will be 7 million deadweight tons, and the market for marine development equipment has broad prospects. More than 70 offshore drilling platforms alone need to be built.
There is no doubt that the next 10 years will be a golden period for the development of China's shipbuilding industry. In support of this, the two major domestic shipbuilding giants, China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation and China State Shipbuilding Corporation, have received a substantial increase in new ship orders, and the production tasks of key shipyards have been fully scheduled until the first half of 2007.
New International Pattern
In 1999, China Ocean Shipping Group (COSCO), the leader of China's shipping industry, and Japan's Kawasaki Heavy Industries invested half and half to establish Nantong COSCO Kawasaki in Nantong City, Jiangsu Province. Naval Engineering Company (NACKS).
Kawasaki Heavy Industries concentrates on the manufacturing of LNG (liquefied natural gas) carriers and gives orders for cargo ships and container ships with low profits to this joint venture. Kawasaki Heavy Industries even gave an order for a VLCC to NACKS.
The emergence of NACKS is the epitome of the new industrial division of labor in the shipbuilding industry on an international scale.
“The rapid rise of China’s shipbuilding industry has further made the competitive landscape of the world’s shipbuilding industry more multi-polar, and has initially formed a five-polar pattern of South Korea, Japan, China, Europe and other regions.” China Shipbuilding Industry Wang Wenjun from the Economic Research Center said.
Historically, the world's shipbuilding center has experienced a shift from west to east: the Mediterranean region once became the world's shipbuilding center because of its natural environment. Since then, the shipbuilding center has moved to Spain, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom; during World War II, it moved to the United States, and later to Japan; in recent years, South Korea has "taken the lead."
Looking from the world map, this is a shift from west to east. From the perspective of the economic development process, it is a shift from currently industrialized countries to later industrialized countries. From the perspective of shipbuilding costs, it is a shift from countries with high labor costs to countries with low labor costs.
At present, in the shipbuilding industry, South Korea and Japan account for about 70% of the share: in 2003, South Korea accounted for 40% of the world's shipbuilding market, while Japan accounted for 40% of the world's shipbuilding market. 35%. At the same time, the focus of the shipbuilding industries of the two countries has begun to shift to high-tech, high value-added ships that emerging shipbuilding countries cannot produce.
China's shipbuilding industry has the advantages of low labor costs and the launch of large-scale shipyards: Since 1998, China's investment in fixed assets has grown at a double-digit rate year after year, and a number of internationally advanced ships have been built. Horizontal shipbuilding berths, as well as large ports, terminals and other infrastructure. At the same time, China's labor costs are only 1/10 to 1/15 of those in Japan and South Korea, and labor costs account for about 30% of a ship. Therefore, China has strong price competitiveness in general ships and their marine equipment and materials.
As for Europe, due to high labor costs and the rise of the shipbuilding industry in Japan, South Korea and other countries, its global market share has continued to decline, from 23% in 1993 to only 15% currently. .
Germany is currently the largest shipbuilding country in Europe, but its shipbuilding scale remains only 2/3 of the level of the former West Germany before 1990, accounting for only about 5% of the global market share, ranking fourth in the world. Sweden's shipbuilding output ranked second in the world more than 30 years ago, second only to Japan, but currently there are only a few ship repair yards, naval ship repair yards and various marine equipment manufacturers left. There are currently only a few shipyards left in Greece, and a large number of ships need to be imported.
However, Europe's demand for ships has been rising in recent years, and it has ordered more new ships in China, becoming China's largest ship export market. From January to June 2003, the value of China's ship exports to Europe reached US$837 million, a year-on-year increase of 135%. Among them, exports to Germany were US$333 million, a year-on-year increase of 200%; exports to Sweden were US$140 million, a year-on-year increase of 170%.
Analysts from the Chinese Ministry of Commerce believe that the rapid growth in European ship demand is a huge opportunity for the development of the Chinese shipbuilding industry.
At the same time, Europe still maintains its advantage in high value-added marine equipment. At present, most of the first-class products and brands supporting ships are still concentrated in Europe. Countries such as Germany and Norway export 60% of their marine equipment.
A new pattern of division of labor in the world's shipbuilding industry has taken shape.
In this new pattern, "China has become the country with the highest growth rate in the world's shipbuilding market. It already has the foundation in all aspects. It is entirely possible for China to become the world's largest shipbuilding country and has the ability to move to a higher level." "The foundation and ability to achieve the goal." Wang Wenjun said, "In addition to the economic environment, the fundamental factor driving the shift in the world's shipbuilding industry is the replacement of high costs by low costs."
Low. The pain of efficiency
However, if China wants to compete with South Korea and Japan, low labor costs alone are not enough for China's shipbuilding industry.
“For China, low production efficiency, low scale efficiency, and low localization rate of supporting equipment have greatly offset China’s labor cost advantage.” An expert who follows China’s shipbuilding industry said .
According to data, in terms of annual per capita shipbuilding tonnage, annual per capita output value and production efficiency, the current gap between Chinese shipyards and advanced foreign shipyards is 5-7 times. According to calculations, if Japan's production efficiency is 1, South Korea is 2/3, and China is only 1/7 to 1/5.
The number of construction hours per ship in China, the annual number of ships built per dock, and the shipbuilding labor productivity are about 5 times, 20%, and 10% respectively of Japan. There is a huge gap.
At the same time, the average electricity consumption of Chinese shipbuilding companies per 10,000 US dollars of output value is 10 times that of Japan, and the time to submit drawings for review is 3-4 times longer than that of Japan and South Korea.
Wang Rongsheng, President of the China Shipbuilding Industry Association, believes that China’s overall shipbuilding level is only roughly equivalent to the international level in the early 1990s. Many high-tech, high value-added ship types, including ultra-large container ships, Large liquefied petroleum gas ships, natural gas ships, luxury tourist ships, etc. are still in the development stage.
“Low cost + low efficiency” has become the most prominent phenomenon in the development of China’s shipbuilding industry.
In order to change this situation, the Chinese government introduced a competition mechanism in the shipbuilding industry. In 1999, the state-owned shipbuilding industry was divided into two groups, one was China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation, which mainly managed Shanghai and other southern shipbuilding enterprises; the other was China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation, which was mainly responsible for the shipbuilding industry in the northern region.
However, like most state-owned enterprises, these two shipbuilding groups have problems such as backward management mechanisms and serious overstaffing. To this day, the production efficiency of China's shipbuilding industry is different from that of advanced shipbuilding companies such as Japan and South Korea. The gap is still huge.
At the same time, the shipbuilding industry has high requirements for market concentration and economies of scale. According to statistics from the British Clarkson Research Company, currently, the world's top five shipbuilding groups account for nearly 50% of the world's market share. For example, South Korea's entire Hyundai Shipbuilding Group (Hyundai Heavy Industries, Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries, and Hyundai Mipo) completed shipbuilding in 2003. The volume reached 11.733 million deadweight tons, accounting for 52.6% of South Korea’s total shipbuilding volume that year and 21.6% of the world’s total shipbuilding volume.
However, China's large-scale shipbuilding capacity is insufficient. The average output of each shipyard is less than 10,000 tons, which is only 1/20 of the average size of South Korean shipyards. If measured by shipyards individually rather than by groups, as of the end of 2003, no shipyard in mainland China had entered the top 10, and only two had entered the top 20. Dalian New Shipbuilding Industry Co., Ltd. ranked 15th, and Nantong COSCO ranked 15th. Kawasaki Shipbuilding ranked 20th. In 2003, China's national shipbuilding completion volume was 6.41 million deadweight tons, which was less than the completion volume of one shipyard of Hyundai Heavy Industries in South Korea (678.1 deadweight tons).
In addition, marine equipment supporting capabilities lag far behind shipbuilding capabilities and have become the most obvious "weakness" of China's shipbuilding industry.
The shipbuilding industry is known as the "marine-oriented equipment industry" and best reflects a country's comprehensive strength. Building a large ship requires the close cooperation of more than 200 supporting companies.
However, China’s domestic equipment shipment rate is too low. In the 1980s, China's shipbuilding industry greatly improved the technical level and supporting capabilities of marine supporting equipment through the introduction of patented technologies and cooperative production methods. By the end of the "Seventh Five-Year Plan", the actual shipping rate of domestic equipment of the former Shipbuilding Corporation had reached more than 70%. However, since the 1990s, with the expansion of the scale of China's shipbuilding industry and the increase and optimization of ship types, the loading rate of domestic marine equipment has continued to decline. From 1991 to 1994, among the 88 large ships built by the former Shipbuilding Corporation, the domestic equipment loading rate was only 52.9%, which dropped to 43.3% in 1995 and further dropped to 41.3% in 1996. By 1998, 59 ships completed that year were exported. For ships and ocean-going ships, the loading rate of domestically produced equipment is only 33.6%. Because domestic supporting enterprises did not digest, absorb, and innovate during the introduction process, and did not turn foreign technologies into products with independent intellectual property rights. In addition, due to problems with maintenance outlets and shipowners specifying marine equipment, the level of localization of marine equipment dropped. It dropped further. By the end of 2000, the localization level of equipment for export ships and ocean-going ships was only about 40%. Until now, the matching rate of domestic electromechanical equipment for Chinese shipbuilding is still less than 50%.
“The low level of supporting industries has become the biggest obstacle restricting the future development of China’s shipbuilding industry.” Wang Rongsheng, president of the China Shipbuilding Industry Association, said that the world’s major shipbuilding countries, such as Japan and South Korea, without exception, have categories Complete and powerful ship supporting industry. The localization rate of Japan's marine equipment industry is not only as high as 97.8%, but also a large amount of exports, with an annual output value of US$8 billion. South Korea's marine equipment industry has a short history of development, but it is developing rapidly, with the localization rate reaching about 80%.
Due to the low level of supporting industries, China's shipbuilding industry has to import supporting products from Europe, Japan, South Korea and other countries, which has greatly reduced the profit margins of China's shipbuilding industry.
It is estimated that over the years, China's key shipyards have imported more than 3 billion US dollars of marine equipment from Japan. The types of imported equipment include marine main engines, marine generator sets, communication and navigation equipment, crankshafts, cables, paints, etc. Ten varieties. Japanese marine steel exports to China are even more impressive. In 2003 alone, China's six shipyards imported 300,000 tons of marine steel plates from Japan, accounting for about half of the six shipyards' total steel consumption.
With the boom in the shipbuilding industry, the price of shipbuilding steel has been rising. It is reported that shipbuilding companies such as Hyundai Heavy Industries, Daewoo Shipbuilding, and Samsung Heavy Industries have recently raised the price of thick plates for shipbuilding by US$153 per ton in negotiations with Japanese steel companies. The price of thick plates produced in Japan was US$280 per ton in the first quarter of last year, and rose to US$420 and US$450 in the second and third quarters of this year respectively. At the beginning of this year, the South Korean government gave priority to domestic shipyards and stopped fulfilling its contract to export shipbuilding steel to China on the grounds of "tight domestic demand."
Tan Naifen of the China Shipbuilding Industry Association believes that due to the special characteristics of marine steel plates - many specifications and small batches, sometimes a ship will use 700 steel plates and require more than 200 specifications. In addition, the requirements for marine steel plates The quality is high and the inspection is very complicated, which makes my country's steel production enterprises reluctant to do such laborious business when the market is good.
At the same time, when purchasing shipbuilding equipment from Europe, Chinese companies settle in euros, but when overseas shipowners pay Chinese companies, it is in U.S. dollars. As the euro strengthens, it also eats into Chinese shipbuilding companies. part of the profits.
Therefore, although in the first quarter of this year, China's 605 shipbuilding industry enterprises above designated size completed a total industrial output value of 19.2 billion yuan and realized product sales revenue of 12.2 billion yuan, the total profit realized after the profits and losses of the entire industry were offset was only 86.2 billion yuan. Ten thousand yuan. There are 205 loss-making enterprises in the shipbuilding industry, accounting for 34% of the total.
“Neither profitability nor debt ratio meets the listing requirements of the China Securities Regulatory Commission.” Tan Naifen explained the reason why there is only one listed company among thousands of shipyards in China - Guangzhou Shipyard International (Information Quotation Forum), and Guangzhou Shipbuilding Industry Co., Ltd. Shipbuilding International's 2003 annual report released on April 19 showed that the sales cost of shipbuilding products was 2.07 billion yuan, with a gross profit margin of only 1.9%.
Even the labor cost advantage that China's shipbuilding industry is proud of will eventually weaken or even disappear with the development of China's economy and the rise in wages and other labor price levels. Experts in the Korean shipbuilding industry predict that in the next 5 to 10 years, the price gap between Korean and Chinese shipbuilding companies in these two aspects will be greatly narrowed.
“At present, the international industrial transfer of the shipbuilding industry has undergone major changes compared with the situation when it was transferred to Japan and South Korea in the past, and the advantages of technology and management have become more obvious.” Experts analyzed that in 10 years After the end of the golden period, if China's shipbuilding industry wants to move forward, it must work hard on high-tech, high-value-added ships. In this way, when China's existing advantages no longer exist, it can use industrial upgrading to make up for the transfer of industries to China. Losses from the shipbuilding industry. In fact, such efforts have already begun.
In 1999, the major national technology digestion and absorption project for "large-scale, high value-added tankers" was launched, with a total investment of nearly 1.3 billion yuan. Dalian New Shipbuilding Industry, which participated in the project, built China's first VLCC in 2001.
In August this year, Shanghai Hudong-Zhonghua Shipbuilding undertook the construction task of two LNG ships. This was also the first time that a Chinese shipbuilding enterprise undertook the construction of LNG ships - and LNG ships are recognized to be difficult to manufacture in the world. largest ship.