Lack of reporting threatens to impact the targeting of ships for PSC inspection
The European Union has stated that it faces serious problems with its ship-monitoring services and nine member states have been requested to comply with regulation or face penalties.
The lack of reporting threatens to impact the targeting of ships for port-state inspection.
Many countries including Belgium, Estonia, France, Hungary, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Finland and the UK have all been requested to comply with EU vessel-traffic monitoring regulation, which were made mandatory under the so-called Erika package of safety measures.SafeSeaNet was introduced under the EU ship-safety directive to allow the exchange of data between member states.
In a statement, the EU said: “To be fully effective (The EU directive) requires joint efforts of all member states. Non-implementation of non-member states prevents the full benefits of the new regime from being realised. Examples of such benefits are faster and more effective decision-making when a maritime accident occurs, better ability to identify ships likely to present a safety or environmental risk, automatic identification and positions systems to reduce the risk of fishing vessels being rammed by merchant ships and better ability to track the movements of ships with dangerous or polluting cargoes.”
The Danish Maritime Administration (DMA) states it will win approval from the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) to further automate its Beltrep ship-reporting system in the Great Belt strait.
This will give ships the option to report through the Automatic Identification System (AIS) and e-mail. Reporting obligations will also be extended to include dangerous goods. The new measures will take effect in July 2013.