A Diplomatic Conference to adopt amendments to the STCW Convention, has agreed, by consensus, a series of new provisions on the issue of "fitness for duty - hours of rest", to provide watchkeeping officers with sufficient rest periods. Under the Manila Amendments to the STCW Convention, all persons who are assigned duty as officer in charge of a watch or as a rating forming part of a watch and those whose duties involve designated safety, prevention of pollution and security duties shall be provided with a rest period of not less than:

Exceptions shall, as far as possible, take into account the guidance regarding prevention of fatigue in section B-VIII/1. 

These provisions were the result of intensive negotiations between regulators and the shipping industry. The new STCW requirements are consistent with the corresponding provisions of ILO's Maritime Labour Convention, 2006.

“More needs to be done with regard to maritime training catering personnel on ships”, said Cyprus Shipping Chamber Chairman Captain Eugen Adami in a keynote address to the SeaChefs seminar in Cyprus. “Today a cadet is on average 21 years when joining ship, by age 45 the first prolonged problems with diet related diseases appear, like high blood pressure, cholesterol etc. This cadet and officer actually served 18 years on board of our ships and was only 6 years on vacation. We made him actually sick”, Captain Adami says!!  

 

He expanded on what owners expect from their catering staff: that they offer dishes based on dietary preferences of all crew and all cultures on board, i.e. no pork for Muslim crew. They offer a variety of menus taking into consideration all hygiene requirements and dietary and health practises. In short wholesome meals served in high quality.

 

What are the current problems? Adami sees three issues: ship managers are having difficulties finding qualified catering staff. Cooks have difficulties offering dishes other than their native dishes on vessels which are manned by European crew. There is a lack of skills: baking skills; a lack in communication skills (English knowledge); a failure in hygiene and safe working practises.

 

He is critical too of cost control and budgeting saying that the frequent discrepancies on board vessels and the manipulation of figures show that catering staff are just not fully aware of the importance of cost controlling and the accurate inventories and sensible provision requisitions.

 

Having pin-pointed the issues he says, “All Cooks and Stewards have to graduate from a accredited catering school. Companies have to develop refresher E-learning courses to keep all Cooks and Stewards regularly abreast with nutrition developments. In conclusion we need common minimum standards for the catering department. We see excellent opportunities for young Europeans to take up this profession and avoid painful unemployment in their home countries.”

 

This underscores the rational for the EU sponsored Sea-Chefs project led by Bernhard Schulte Ship Management to find answers to the burning issues and assist the industry to kick-start a new and long overdue certification for ships’ cooks. 

 

A report on the Cyprus seminar by Captain Ralph Becker Heins of MSG MarineServe GmbH is attached. 

What ship and crew managers should watch out for.

This Brief lists on one page the key points in the detailed debates and decisions at IMO that will impact on shipmanagers' business in the years ahead.  For more detail and background information see the posting titled Outcomes of Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) Meeting 60th session: 22-26 March, 2010.

At this meeting the MEPC found difficulty in making tangible progress on the issue of reduction in Greenhouse Gases due to the legacy of COP15 and the continuing divide between the developed and developing world which caused tension from time to time in the plenary sessions. Despite this, it was important for InterManager to be one of the many NGOs present in an almost unprecedented packed auditorium in order to keep a close eye on the technical, operational and commercial ramifications of the discussions taking place.

For this meeting 159 papers were tabled for consideration of which 100 referenced Green House Gases (GHG). 

This report summaries outcomes.

Draft amendments to the STCW Convention, and its associated Code, have been approved by the Sub-Committee on Standards of Training and Watchkeeping (STW) and are ready for submission to a Diplomatic Conference in Manila, Philippines, 21-25 June 2010, for adoption.

The proposed amendments are the first major revision of the two instruments since those, completely revising the original 1978 Convention, adopted in 1995.

The attachment summaries the outcomes of the last sub-committee meeting before the Conference.

The status quo in IMO representation is retained in the current elections conducted at the IMO Assembly meeting in London. It continues the regime of a low level of representation across Africa and South America and an over representation amongst the EU.   The Council is the executive of IMO and is responsible, under the Assembly, for supervising the work of the Organization. Between sessions of the Assembly the Council performs all the functions of the Assembly, except the function of making recommendations to Governments on maritime safety and pollution prevention which is reserved for the Assembly. The Council is elected by the Assembly for a two-year term.

Liberia contributes 8.6% to the IMO annual budget but failed to achieve sufficient votes to gain a position in the new Council.

Council members for the 2009-10 biennium in three categories of voting are as follows.

China, Greece, Italy, Japan, Norway, Panama, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation, United Kingdom and United states

 Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, India, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden

 Australia, Bahamas, Belgium, Chile, Cyprus, Denmark, Egypt, Indonesia, Jamaica, Kenya, Malaysia , Malta, Mexico, Nigeria, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Thailand, and Turkey

 The attached report covers key achievements of IMO in the last two years.

With the coming switch to ECDIS navigating officers face more challenging software in the workplace than ever before. To ensure safety of navigation it is paramount each equipment unit is properly operated. A tough challenge considering AIS, ARPA, ECDIS and GMDSS may come from many different makers. For example, more than 20 manufacturers offer 30 different types of radars alone all with different interface layouts.

 

Only if correct and efficient handling of the bridge equipment is assured, can the safety of the ship also be assured. Safe carriage of the cargo, the safety of life and prevention of pollution are critical and dependent upon safe bridge operations. Officers’ competence plays a crucial part. This issue is being addressed by a new EU initiative. Speaking at a recent seminar project coordinator Prof Becker-Heins of the Bremen Shipping University said, “An approach to enhance faultless usage of watch-keeping equipment is of the utmost importance. We face a potential major disaster if officers do not fully understand the operational capabilities and limitations.

 

Generally officers receive type-specific training only during vocational education on just one or two systems. Once on board the hand-over time is limited before the relief will be at sea and in full charge of the vessel. Confronted with new equipment he is probably not familiarised with the radars, communication, navigation, safety or any other bridge equipment”.

 

The objective of SAFEBRIDGE is to advance classical CBT tools and knowledge management systems to a competence verification and training interface exactly replicating and integrating the desktop structure of the navigation consoles in question. To achieve this, a tool will be developed which is not a modified copy of the original application software but an autonomous applet mirroring certain screenshots of the application with a selected pre-defined operability. The competence verification and training tool will be completed by tutorial explanations / animations to illustrate the operation of the relevant control elements. Because trainees can learn directly on the console’s graphical interface the required knowledge is transferred immediately one-to-one to the real equipment and the real situation.

 

Becker-Heins says, “The key problem shipping faces today is how to accelerate the transition of cognitive knowledge to inherent experience.  In other words, how to make the untrained and inexperienced perform better in a shorter period of time”.

 

For more information see www.safebridge.eu

The process of revising and updating the STCW Convention has been underway since 2005 and is now in the final phases with just one sub-committee meeting in London in January 2010, before the convening a diplomatic conference in Manila in June 2010 at which Governments  will agree the changes and a schedule for their adoption and implementation.

The file contains the latest text and indicates the additions and deletions proposed in Chapter III Standard regarding the engine department and Guidance.

Members are requested for feedback and questions on the draft text.