Shipbuilding In Korea

Hyundai Shipyard in Ulsan, South Korea

Today South Korea is the largest shipbuilding nation in the world. The links to the two news articles on this post explain the competition between South Korea and China over shipbuilding. In the first article, which was published in 2005 by the New York Times, explains that recently South Korea has overtaken Japan as the world's largest shipbuilding nation, but China looms to become the next largest. The second article, which was published by the Chosun Ilbo, explains how even today there is still competition between China and South Korea. Also the second article states that Korea has recently just regained the lead from China in shipbuilding. The Hyundai Shipyard pictured above, is currently the world's largest shipyard, and is so efficient and technologically advanced that a $80 million ship is released into waters every four working days. The video below gives an overview of the Hyundai shipyard and some of its qualities that make it the best and biggest shipyard in the world. South Korea is attempting to maintain is position as the world's largest shipbuilding nation despite how China is on the rise. Korea has a lot of history when it comes to ship building. Dating back to the Koryo dynasty, during Mongol rule, Koryo had to build and supply ships for the Mongols. Later in the Choson dynasty, the world's first ironclad warship was built, called the turtleship. Korea has a long history of shipbuilding and is an important practice that has been around for hundreds of years.

The video below shows a glimpse of the technology used at the Hyundai Shipyard, and some of its key features. One aspect of just shipbuilding in Korea in general that stood out and was mentioned in the video was that it was well organized and the style in which the company operated was similar to the military. This is possibly a reason for the efficiency of the shipyard and is very distinct compared to other shipyards around the world. China is projected to become the world leader in shipbuilding by 2015, primarily because it has such a massive cheap labor force. But nonetheless South Korea today is trying to maintain its position by shifting its focus to ships that are used for container transportation.

As a naval architecture and marine engineering major here at the University of Michigan, I hope to one day be able to go to Korea and see what the Hyundai shipyard is like and maybe even work there in the near future. I personally have never been to a shipyard so it will be a good experience. Prior to my major declaration as a naval architecture and marine engineer, I actually was unaware that South Korea is world wide leader in shipbuilding. As of right now the naval architecture and marine engineering is one the smallest departments in the College of Engineering, but I feel like it will one day grow to be a much bigger sector in engineering. More than 70% of the earth's surface is covered by water, and thus shipbuilding is a crucial in many aspects of society (transportation, trade, entertainment, etc.). But I hope to one day be able to work at the Hyundai Shipyard and just see how advanced and how great the world's largest shipyard is.

news articles:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/05/business/worldbusiness/05iht-ships.html

http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2011/07/18/2011071801100.html