France's CMA-CGM container shipping company wants to delay the delivery of 49 ships it has ordered and is due to receive within the next three years, the company's CEO said Monday.

"Our first objective is to obtain the delay of the delivery of those ships" and an agreement on a payment schedule, Rodolphe Saade was quoted as saying in an interview in the Les Echos business daily.

He said CMA-CGM, the world's number three container shipper which employs 17,000 worldwide, saw its revenues drop by around 30 percent in the first half of this year as shipping volumes and tariff fell during the global economic crisis.

"We stood up better than our competitors," said Saade, although the company dropped sharply into the red with a net loss of 515 million dollars (346 million euros).

The heavily-indebted French company, which now owes 5.6 billion dollars, announced last month a steering committee including banks and financial institutions that is supposed to draft a plan to return the company to profitability next year and secure its long-term future.