Novel Coronavirus

Seafarer COVID-vaccination numbers continue to climb

Pictured: artist’s concept of a COVID vaccine. Photo credit: Daniel Schludi via Unsplash

About 41% of the world’s seafaring workforce has been COVID-vaccinated, according to the latest data from the Neptune Declaration’s Crew Change Indicator.

The Neptune Declaration is an agreement subscribed to by about 850 organizations that are urging the end of the crew change crisis.

The Neptune Declaration Crew Change Indicator provides up-to-date information on the crew change situation. The Indicator is...

https://www.shippingaustralia.com.au/seafarer-covid-vaccination-numbers-continue-to-climb/

Ocean shipping industry has repeatedly demonstrated anti-COVID measures

Pictured: a representation of a seafarer wearing a mask aboard a containership. Credit: Sebastian Herrmann – freetousesounds Unsplash – Jim Wilson

Global ocean-going shipping companies have repeatedly demonstrated to the authorities in general that the shipping industry is taking a great number of measures to keep its crews and shore side communities safe from COVID.

Back in July 2020, using our connections with international shipping associations, world shipping bodies and global shipping...

https://www.shippingaustralia.com.au/ocean-shipping-industry-has-repeatedly-demonstrated-anti-covid-measures/

NSW officials and maritime sector meet to tackle COVID

Pictured: an electron microscope image of the SARS-CoV-2 virus which causes the disease COVID-19. Image: NIH NIAD

After 10 months of the COVID-19 crises and plenty of uncertainty over the management of maritime workers and seafarers, medical care, seafarer crew changes and access to medical care real consultation started yesterday. NSW public health officials, other transport and maritime officials and industry representatives met to tackle some of these tricky public issues confronting the...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/nsw-officials-and-maritime-sector-meet-to-tackle-covid/

New crew-change policy is neat, plausible… and wrong

Pictured: a fully-cellular containership heads into the sunset; Credit: Pixabay

Shipping Australia is very concerned about the ongoing crisis caused by a lack of crew changes. Hundreds of thousands of people are trapped at sea and hundreds of thousands of people are waiting (without pay) to go to sea. It is a humanitarian crisis.

We have long advocated that measures should be taken to enable crew changes to occur as this is in the health and safety interests of the crew and in the vital economic...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/new-crew-change-policy-is-neat-plausible-and-wrong/

Regional WA crew changes now virtually impossible

Pictured: seafarers silhouetted against the sunset. Ship crews around the world will continue to suffer because of polices, rules and restrictions like those of the WA Government.
Credit Skeeze from Pixabay.

Western Australia’s almost complete re-write of its crew change rules earlier this week now means it is almost impossible to carry out a crew change anywhere in WA except Perth. And even there, it is not easy.

Crew changes now really only possible in Perth

On-signing seafarers can fly into...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/regional-wa-crew-changes-now-virtually-impossible/

Waterfront strike threat: how the industrial relations environment has been – legally – manipulated to Australia’s detriment

Widespread strike action on the waterfront is now possible. Transport unions have arranged matters so that all of the major container stevedores are now operating with expired enterprise agreements.

The last major container stevedore had its enterprise agreement expire in June. Nation-wide and sector-wide protected industrial action by unions is now therefore possible under the Fair Work Act.

Some of those enterprise bargaining arrangements have in fact been expired for years because the unions...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/waterfront-strike-threat-how-the-industrial-relations-environment-has-been-legally-manipulated-to-australias-detriment/

Domestic shippers should look to coastal shipping to ease road and rail freight bottlenecks

Coastal shipping could provide relief to the freight congestion caused by onerous and confusing state COVID testing and self-isolation rules.

Some container shipping lines already carry domestic freight between Australian capital cities on regular services at better-than-weekly frequency.

Shippers with regular shipping requirements already find it advantageous to look to the “blue highway” to move their cargoes between Australian States and to avoid the border road-blocks being imposed by...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/domestic-shippers-should-look-to-coastal-shipping-to-ease-road-and-rail-freight-bottlenecks/

OPINION: as an industrial action crisis looms, it is no accident that enterprise agreements have expired across the waterfront

Industrial action at the DP World container terminals around the country may just be the tip of a “protected industrial action” iceberg.

A deliberate, organised and co-ordinated campaign to cause widespread disruption across the cargo-handling waterfront appears to be underway. 

Ocean freight and logistics is vital to the lives of everyday Australians no matter how far they live from the sea. It’s especially true right now that international aviation is working at a fraction of capacity.

Ships...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/opinion-as-an-industrial-action-crisis-looms-it-is-no-accident-that-enterprise-agreements-have-expired-across-the-waterfront/

Shipping Australia briefs Australian Federal Government on seafarer crew change crisis

Photo credit: stock agency Pixabay

Earlier this week the Shipping Australia Secretariat provided a comprehensive brief to Federal Government officials on the crew change crisis.

Shipping Australia was asked, at very short notice, to provide a brief on how the shipping industry takes into account the need for COVID-19 risk mitigation together with evidence that the shipping industry alleviates that risk through action.

Consideration of risk

To demonstrate that the international shipping industry is...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/shipping-australia-briefs-australian-federal-government-on-seafarer-crew-change-crisis/

Shipping companies protect seafarer health against COVID-19, survey reveals

Pictured: a generic image of a small containership. Photo: Hectorgalarza from Pixabay.

A new joint survey by the International Chamber of Shipping and the International Transport Federation reveals that shipping companies are taking strong measures to protect the health of seafarers and the general public from COVID-19.

Measures being taken include the provision of information, training and equipment along with hard surface disinfection. Other measures include physical segregation of seafarers...

https://shippingaustralia.com.au/shipping-companies-protect-seafarer-health-against-covid-19-survey-reveals/

+ More