The Global Maritime Forum established a taskforce to address the challenges faced by seafarers and resolve the crew change crisis as quickly as possible, focusing on four issues that need to be addressed and solved.
Specifically, the taskforces addresses four issues:
- The importance to recognize seafarers as key workers
- The implementation of high-quality health protocols
- Increase collaboration between ship operators and charterers to facilitate crew changes
- Ensure airline connectivity between key maritime hubs
The issue of designating seafarers as key workers has been at the centre of discussions lately, with UN and IMO having issued circulars to support this action.
In addition, they propose the implementation of high-quality health protocols to ensure seafarers can move safely and securely to-and-from ships, via airports and other transport hubs, keeping in mind that the current crew change restrictions are due to health risks.
The maritime industry has already developed such protocols, which have been recognized by the International Maritime Organization. Yet, it is stated that these protocols have not been consistently implemented across all relevant jurisdictions or by all relevant stakeholders.
Global Maritime Forum applauds the Singapore Shipping Tripartite Alliance Resilience (SG-STAR) Fund initiative as a gold standard that and they recommend other jurisdictions to adopt to facilitate safe crew changes.
To remind, the SG-STAR Fund is a collaboration between the government of Singapore, the shipping industry including the International Chamber of Shipping and seafarer unions such as the ITF, that recommend best practices and safe measures in the home country of the seafarer as well as in the country where the crew change will take place.
A challenge that needs to be solved is the interplay between ship operators and charterers. When a normal crew change cannot be carried out due to government restrictions or a lack of airline connectivity, the ship operator needs permission from the charterer before deviating to another port or delaying departure to allow a crew change to take place.
The Forum concludes that
We believe that facilitating crew changes is a shared responsibility. Ship owners and charterers should collaborate to ensure that necessary crew changes can be carried out with the least impact possible in terms of cost and delays.
