JAPAN AS A SHIPBUILDER

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 256, 17 July 1918, Page 5

JAPAN AS A SHIPBUILDER

■' ' 4 ; — INCREASE IN CAPACITY AND PRODUCTION. Japan's shipbuilding industry has become one of the most important linos of business that have been developed under the war's influence. Shipbuilding yards have become doubly or trebly as important as in tho pre-war period. According to a semi-official report there aro more than forty yards employing upwards of three thousand hands each. Tho greatest . number of those are in Osaka, the i;est , being in Nagasaki, Hiroshima, lvobe, and Yokohama. Their combined capital ( was roughly estimated at 3(5,500,000 yen , before the war, but now it Stands at t.p- , proximately 63,750,000 yen. Although the ! exact number of their stocks and docks . are now p. secret, together with tho correct estimnto of Japan's total tonnage, : they aro now known to be able to turn out freight or passenger boat 3 of oier 10,000 tons. Wooden vessels of 1000 tons or more can also be turned out. During last year these yards launched 5 seventy-two vessels above 1000 tons, the total tonnage amounting to 333,617. In 1 November last' year their activity reach- ' ed its height, when ten boats with a 1 combined tonnage of 38,627 were launch- s ed. But for the heavy handicap.imposed 1 on them by America's ban on steel and ' tho delay in tho settlement of the nego- 1 tiations between Japan and America, the ' activities of Japanese shipbuilding >i\vds j might have been uiore remarkable, con- 1 sidering that last year's turnout, under s tlio discouraging circumstances, was t nearly '10,000 tons above tho official u- a timato of tho year's new ships. Of these i new bottoms Japan sold thirteen, witli ' a combined lonnage of roughly 80,090, to : foreign owners. _ f Tli > position of Japan as ship-supplier has thus been well demonstrated. When the sale of old bottoms is considered, its importance becomes even greater. According to official reports for 1015, oniy j seven boats, with a combined tonnage of \ 39,010, wero exported from Japan, but 0 in tho following year tho figure rose to | 07 boats, with a combined tonnage of f 17.173.iy5, including a few now bottoms, j Last year there was a further increase to 70 boats, with a combined tonnage of ] ( 07,070,100 tons, while Japan's purchase or (, chartering of foreign boats was almost completely stopped.