Daewoo expanded into the construction business, helping the new village movement, a development program for rural Korea. The corporation also took advantage of the burgeoning African and Middle Eastern markets. Daewoo received its GTC designation during this time. Major investment support was offered by the South Korean government to the corporation in the form of subsidized loans. The competing countries were angered by the strict import controls of South Korea, but the government knew that, without help, the chaebols will never survive the global recession caused by the oil crisis during the 1970s. Protectionist policies were essential to make certain that the economy continued to grow.
Daewoo's move into shipbuilding was required by the government, even though Kim felt that both Hyundai and Samsung had greater skill in heavy engineering and was more suited to shipbuilding compared to Daewoo. Kim did not want to take responsibility for the largest dockyard in the world, at Okpo. He said lots of times that the government of Korea was stifling his entrepreneurial instinct by forcing him to undertake actions based on responsibility instead of revenue. Despite his reluctance, Kim was able to turn Daewoo Shipbuilding and Heavy Machinery into a really successful company manufacturing oil rigs and ships which are competitively priced on a tight production timetable. This happened during the 1980s when the economy within South Korea was going through a liberalization stage.
In this period, the government relaxed its protectionist measures and encouraged the existence of small- and medium-sized companies. Daewoo was forced to divest two of its crucial textile corporations, and its shipbuilding industry faced stiffer competition from overseas. The government's objective was to shift to a free market economy by encouraging a more effective allocation of resources. Such a policy was intended to make the chaebols more aggressive in their international dealings. However, the new economic conditions caused some chaebols to fail. The Kukje Group, among Daewoo's competitors, went into liquidation in 1985. The shift of government favour to small private businesses was intended to spread the wealth that had before been concentrated in Korea's industrial centers, Pusan and Seoul.