Asia

Clock ticking down to potential crewing crisis

 

Manila: There is a real risk of a manning meltdown this year, with scant coverage of the potential crisis facing world trade.
 
The European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) has repeatedly warned that the Philippines has not satisfactorily complied with the Standards of Training, Certification and Watch-keeping or STCW, set for seafarers under the International Maritime Organization Convention, which has been adopted by the European Union. If the EU withdraws its recognition of Philippine compliance with the STCW, EU-registered ships can no longer hire Filipino seafarers. Filipinos provide more crews to the world’s merchant fleet than any other nation.
 
No date has yet been set for the 2013 EMSA inspection, writes our guest writer Barista Uno in this week’s SeaShip News In Focus, to the right of the homepage. “With Philippine elections due to be held in May, there's an odds-on chance that the Commission will instruct EMSA to conduct the checks after June, possibly in September,” Uno writes. “This would buy more time for the Filipinos and allow them to install a more effective system for the State supervision of maritime schools, a major issue as far as EMSA is concerned.”
 

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