The Hindu Business Line : Officers shortage hits shipping industry

Waning interest
People on board have to carry on lots of job responsibility in a very short time owing to over regulation.
With number of people manning a vessel having dropped, there is less of socialising on board — as against an average of 30-50 on-board in the past.

Amit Mitra

Mumbai April 4

Increasing shortage of qualified officers to man sea-going vessels continues to confront the Indian shipping industry, even as the shipping fleet is fast expanding with ship owners lining up significant investments to buy marine assets.

Global demand

In fact, this is a problem that the global shipping industry is facing. Industry estimates point that the worldwide demand for seafarers is 4.76 lakh officers, as against an availability of 4.66 lakh. It is estimated that this shortfall of 10,000 may nearly treble to 27,000 by 2015, as new orders for ships have increased and scraping has dropped. The world shipping fleet is growing at about three per cent, with new orders totalling nearly 50 per cent of the existing fleet size.

Shortage of manpower was one of the major issues discussed during the 45th National Maritime Day celebrations.

Preference to foreign flag

Despite being one of the major seafarer supplying nation, India is not able to provide adequate number of seafarers to man Indian flag vessels, with many of the officers preferring to sail on-board foreign flag vessels owing to discrepancy in taxation policies. It is estimated that India faces a shortage of about 1,000 officers at the moment, which is expected to grow further.

Out of the total Indian officers of 26,900, only 8,900 are employed in Indian flag vessels, while the remaining 18,000 in foreign flag vessels, according to Indian National Shipowners Association (INSA) data.

Over-regulation

Why has there been a decline in interests for students to take up a seafaring career? Industry experts say over-regulation of the industry, owing to which people on board have to carry on lots of job responsibility in a very short time, was one reason. Also, with number of people manning a vessel having dropped, there is less of socialising on board — as against an average of 30-50 people on-board in the past, many vessels today are run with just 18 people. Increasing global outsourcing of crew has led to ships carrying a mix of people from different countries and this is making seafarers homesick.

Earlier, one of the attractions of the career was a sailor could get to see the world. “The same is, however, no more true now as due to automation, many vessels stay at ports for a few hours only, as against number of days in the past. Many ports accommodate tankers at SBM (single-buoy mooring) facilities, which mean the vessel is miles away from shore,” an industry expert pointed out.

Mr Kailash Gupta, SCI Director, feels that there is a need to upgrade ratings to higher competencies and move to a regime of vessel specific manning standards.

Not only the shipping industry, but even the Indian ports and logistics industry is facing skilled manpower shortages. “Today shipping is no more port-to-port service, but it now involves door-to-door services. New logistics services being offered by shipping lines include customs brokerage, cargo consolidation, packaging and repackaging and distribution services. All these activities require skilled manpower,” points out Mr Anil Devli, Vice-Chairman of the Container Shipping Lines Association (India).

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