As MACN reports, corruption is one of the most challenging risks for any business, and doing business in Ukraine is no exception. In Ukraine, the shipping industry faces challenges such as in connection with documentation handling and controls of on board practices regarding waste disposal, and ballast water discharge among others.
Lately there has been a steady increase in the number of anonymously reported incidents through MACNs anonymous incident reporting mechanism in Ukraine and more than 230 cases of corrupt demands have reported for Ukraine.
Most of the incidents are reported from Yuzhny, Odessa, Mykolaiv (Nikolaev) and Chernomorsk (Illyichevsk) ports, but reports are also coming in from several other ports as well. In these reports, requests for large cash payments are common.
According to MACNs data, in 2018 Ukraine was on the top 10 countries of where unofficial large demands for cash in ports were reported, and one of the top 10 countries with most safety threats when corrupt demands were rejected.
What is more, declining demands lead to delays of the ship and threat of fines for alleged non-compliance.
For this reason, MACN launched a survey to gain a better insight to the issues regarding improper demands in the ports of Ukraine. This will be used as a base to develop a targeted long-term collaborative action plan to fight corruption in the Black Sea region, focusing on Ukraine.
In addition, Britannia announced that it has become the first P&I Club to be accepted as a member of the Maritime Anti-Corruption Network (MACN). By joining MACN, Britannia aspires to provide the Network with input from an insurance sector perspective.
