The invisible industry?

There are lots of good things to be said for shipping; its position as the fulcrum on which the global economy turns, success in reducing major accidents and spills, the continued pushing of technology boundaries to name just three.

As we know though, there are problems too and as shown by the ongoing pandemic, these problems are not confined to the industry. It has shown governments in fairly poor light too, despite the hard work done by some to find short term solutions.

The coming year promises more not less pressure on seafarers, since even with a vaccine, the process of managing population behaviour remains difficult in some regions and close to impossible in others.

There is a clear argument for removing people from the dangerous business of running ships, or at least some people, since technology and connectivity are both better than they were 10 years ago. Whether the industry has fully considered this problem, with the attendant social costs that would follow from mass redundancy of seafarers is open to question. Whether it is really possible is another.

But the clock is ticking either way. The industry needs to find a solution to the challenge of keeping people on ships safe and allowing them the same human rights as anybody else. The risk to the industry of not achieving that is huge in terms of potential disruption and incalculable in terms of liability.

Read the full post here.