On a rainy afternoon at one of China’s largest shipyards, workers taking a break from welding cluster beneath the hulls of half-built vessels to keep dry.

Despite the collapse in freight rates that has ravaged the shipping industry, the yard at Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding is not short of business. A worker could ride his bicycle across the 1.1km yard entirely under the line of partial hulls.

This and other state-owned shipyards are being kept busy by China Ocean Shipping Group, better known as Cosco, the country’s largest shipper by carrying capacity, which ordered 11 huge container ships last year. Caixin, the financial magazine, reported that the three ships ordered from Waigaoqiao would be able to carry 20,000 20ft containers, making them the world’s largest.