South Korean shipyards are likely to suffer difficulties in the second half of this year, a new survey said Monday, amid declining new orders over the protracted global economic slump.
South Korean shipbuilders clinched a combined 830,000 compensated gross ton worth of orders in the first half, down 88 percent from 6.85 million CGTs a year earlier, according to the data compiled by global research firm Clarkson Research Services.
The first-half new orders mark the lowest figure that South Korean shipbuilders have ever clinched since the global research agency began to compile related data in 1996.
The reading is also far lower than the previous record low of 6.51 million CGTs in the first half of 1999, and 7.79 million CGTs in 2009 when the financial rout hit the global economy.
The Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry said in its forecast for the second half that there are growing concerns that some of the existing orders could be canceled as economic uncertainties in Europe heightened following Britain's decision to leave the European Union.
Song Eui-young, an economics professor at Sogang University and an advisor to the KCCI, said that it's time for South Korean shipbuilders to thoroughly assess their current situation.
The KCCI also said its forecast for the information technology sector in the second half could be cloudy, noting Europe accounts for 20 percent of South Korea's smartphone shipments at a time when post-Brexit uncertainties may weaken Europe's economic growth.
The KCCI global smartphone sales this year could drop 7 percent from a year earlier.
The KCCI said South Korea's steel industry is also cloudy in the second half, citing rising protectionism.
In May, the U.S. Department of Commerce decided to impose anti-dumping tariffs of 48 percent on South Korean galvanized steel sheets, saying they are sold at unfairly low prices in America.
Also cloudy is the forecast for the auto industry, the KCCI said, citing the end of a temporary consumption tax cut program and a decline of South Korea's shipments of cars to Central and South America and the Middle East.
The consumption tax cut program, which ended in June, had boosted sales of cars.
In comparison, the KCCI said its forecast of construction and oil refining and petrochemical industries is only slightly cloudy, meaning that their businesses could get better in the second half.
South Korea's exports of gasoline to Asian countries jumped 59 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier, the KCCI said.
The KCCI said it conducted the survey from June 7 last year to July 4. (Yonhap)