Seoul: South Korea ranked second in new global shipbuilding orders in August, trailing China, as overall order placements significantly decreased by 65 percent from the previous year, industry data revealed.

According to Yonhap News Agency, global shipbuilding orders dropped 65 percent year-on-year to 2.44 million compensated gross tons (CGT) last month, as reported by London-based Clarkson Research Services. CGT is a metric used to reflect the actual workload in shipbuilding.

South Korea secured 560,000 CGT in August, following China's 1.38 million CGT, accounting for 23 percent and 57 percent of the total, respectively. The average CGT per vessel for South Korea was 70,000, almost three times higher than China's 24,000 CGT, indicating a focus on value-added ships such as liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers and very large container carriers.

The global shipbuilding order backlog reached 164 million CGT in August, reflecting a decrease of 980,000 CGT from the previous month. South Korea constituted 21 percent of this backlog, amounting to 34.52 million CGT, while China held 61 percent, or 99.92 million CGT.