Yards face closure as orders collapse

The shipbuilding industry looks set for a rash of insolvencies as one of the sharpest-ever collapses in order levels combines with banks’ reluctance to finance ship construction to starve many yards of cash. Only 28.8m deadweight tonnes (dwt) of ships were ordered between January and November in 2009, according to London-based Clarkson shipbrokers, against 272m dwt for the whole of 2007, the peak of the shipping boom.