More than 300 representatives of seafarers, ship owners and governments, meeting at the International Labour Organization (ILO), have taken concrete steps to protect abandoned seafarers and provide financial security for compensation in cases of death and long-term disability due to occupational injury or hazard.
The measures come in the form of amendments to the ILO’s Maritime Labour Convention, 2006, which were adopted without opposition. They will now be sent to the ILO’s International Labour Conference in May for approval.
Mandatory Requirements
The amendments were developed over nearly a decade by a Joint Working Group established by the ILO and the IMO in 1998 and will strengthen the 2006 Convention. They establish mandatory requirements that ship owners have financial security to cover abandonment, as well as death or long-term disability of seafarers due to occupational injury and hazard.
'The new measures will guarantee that seafarers are not abandoned, alone and legally adrift for months on end, without pay, adequate food and water and away from home,' Cleopatra Doumbia-Henry, Director of the ILO Labour Standards Department, said. 'They also clearly make flag states responsible for ensuring that adequate financial security exists to cover the cost of abandonment, and claims for death and long-term disability due to occupational injury and hazards.'
Certificates
Under the new provisions, ships will be required to carry certificates or other documents to establish that financial security exists to protect seafarers working on board. Failure to provide this protection may mean that a ship can be detained in a port.
The ILO Maritime Labour Convention, 2006 came into force on 20 August 2013. To date, 57 ILO Member States representing more than 80 per cent of the world’s global shipping tonnage have ratified the Convention. As of March 2014, the ILO’s Abandonment of Seafarers Database listed 159 abandoned merchant ships, some dating back to 2006 and still unresolved.
