The declining attractiveness of working at sea: Where do we go from here?

The maritime sector is the backbone of the global supply chain, with 90 per cent of the world trade, from fish that we eat for dinner to gas for our cars, being carried by sea from one part of the world to another.

Keeping global trade moving during the COVID-19 pandemic has been one of the major priorities for countries across the world, as they vowed to ensure the supply of food and medicine by declaring ports critical infrastructure.

However, the workers who are in charge of ensuring goods arrive at their destination have not been provided with the same treatment and recognition.

On the contrary, they have been denied shore-leave and even medical care for non-COVID 19 related emergencies. Thankfully, the infection cases on board ships have been sporadic, and the industry has so far managed to keep outbreaks relatively low. Nevertheless, crews have not been completely spared from the disease.

“Seafarers are at the heart of everything IMO does. In the darkest hours of the pandemic, they have been selflessly delivering the goods we all need. But their own health and wellbeing are as important as that of anyone else. Now is time for governments around the world to deliver for seafarers, by ensuring they can access medical care without delay, whenever they need it,” IMO Secretary-General Kitack Lim said in his latest call to governments on facilitating medical access to crews in line with IMO’s recommendations.

The ordeal of seafarers has been under the spotlight for months now as the number of men and women stuck at sea and unable to sign off hit the roof due to travel restrictions imposed due to the pandemic.

Instead, seafarers have been faced with contract extensions, and some of them haven’t gone home for over a year.

According to the latest figures from the International Chamber of Shipping, around 200,000 seafarers are stuck at sea unable to go home, with 200,000 stranded on land, unable to sign onto ships for months.

The designation of seafarers as key workers would allow hundreds of thousands of mariners to repatriate, allowing new crews, stuck in hotels for months, to start their contracts and start earning their paychecks.

The efforts of certain governments and ship owners and managers to enable their crews to go home though chartered flights is just a drop in the sea as there is a need for a comprehensive and systematic approach.

The ball is now in the court of the national governments that need to push forward with the exemption of seafarers from travel restrictions and allow airlines to carry out flights that would enable these people to return to their homes.

The pandemic has been hard on everyone, as we have had to change our way of life.

However, as thousands of us work in the comfort of our homes, being disrupted by our kids from another room during a Zoom meeting, seafarers don’t have that luxury.

The pressure of keeping goods moving has taken a great toll on the mental health and wellbeing of seafarers.

Some of them have missed weddings, the births of their children, haven’t heard from home for a while and are concerned about their families and loved ones.

The long-overdue solution to the crisis and lack of sensibility from governments has had a dehumanizing impact, as this ‘out of sight out of mind’ approach to resolving the issue has neglected seafarers’ rights, needs and emotional state.

The industry’s outcry to resolve the crew change crisis and the fight for the designation of seafarers as key workers have yet again uncovered the harsh reality of working at sea.

The most striking thing about seafarers’ ordeals is the lack of data about their everyday issues at a time when data connectivity and even remote operation of a ship’s equipment and even an entire ship is possible.

So how is it possible that we have so much data about a ship’s operation and so few about the people, who live and breathe on those ships?

A recent study from the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Mobility and Transport (DG MOVE) said that due to the international and fluid nature of maritime transport accurate and comparable data on seafaring have traditionally been scarce.

“As such, policy makers (and researchers) are deprived of key information that would normally be used to identify problems and success factors, and to base decisions. While there is widespread acknowledgement of this problem and notable efforts to improve the provision of data (notably the ECSA- and ETF-led MapMar project to map maritime professionals), a long-term solution that would allow for official, comprehensive and comparable data on seafarers is yet to materialise. ”

The study urges for prioritising data on seafaring in order for the industry and governments to be able to develop relevant strategies in line with current issues and requirements.

Another devastating information is the fact that there is no official, reliable source on the scale of seafarers’ suicides, as indicated by Seafarers UK maritime welfare charity.

The comment was made in the wake of the rising number of reports of seafarers stranded on ‘mothballed’ cruise ships taking their own lives.

The charity said that prolonged time at sea due to contract extensions combined with denied access to ashore at ports and welfare activities and workers have further added to both the physical and mental strain of workers who feel neglected and powerless.

“I have been astonished to discover that there is no single source of data on how many seafarers have taken their own lives during the coronavirus pandemic. In fact, alarmingly, it appears no one has been or is keeping an accurate global record of seafarer suicides,” Seafarers UK’s Chief Executive Officer Catherine Spencer said.

“This may be because suicides do not result in claims handled by the P&I Clubs that provide insurance for most merchant ship owners. But that picture also is unclear, as some suicides at sea may be being recorded erroneously as fatal accidents. Unless we know the true extent of the problem, how can we target our support for seafarers and those working on the front line to support seafarers’ welfare?“

Spencer urged the International Labour Organization (ILO) to consider what steps need to be taken, with regard to the Maritime Labour Convention 2006, to ensure that all seafarer suicides are accurately identified, recorded and shared with the organization that provide welfare services to seafarers.

When approached to ILO, Offshore Energy-Green Marine got the reply that the organization doesn’t collect figures on suicides of seafarers, directing our editors to different sources which are yet to reply to our publication on the matter.

Based on the figures we have been provided with, there have been between 9 and 12 suicides, not including suicide attempts, during the COVID-19 period.

Gender representation and diversity remain an issue, with the number of women in the sector being very low.

“Despite some bright spots (e.g. in the Nordic countries and Netherlands), women persistently occupy lower-status and lower-paid jobs, and, just like other marginalised groups, suffer from harassment, stereotyping and discrimination. While there is widespread acknowledgement of these problems, there is little agreement about how to solve them, with much of the action taken so far being preliminary and out of proportion to the scale of the problems faced,” DG MOVE’s study reads.

The maritime industry is already suffering from insufficient staffing.

BIMCO started reporting a deficit of seafarers since 2005, forecasting a possible global shortage of officers to rise to 147,500 by 2025.

The profession used to be a great way of travelling the world and meeting different cultures. However, with the growing globalization, travelling the world has become more common without having to venture out to sea as a career choice.

Furthermore, prolonged times at sea, away from family and friends, often with poor access to communication and internet connectivity don’t really go hand in hand with the growing push of the new generations for greater work and life balance.

The declining attractiveness of a career at sea is also linked to generally poor working conditions and poor prospects for career progression, according to DG MOVE’s study which focuses on the EU.

“These problems are more acute in higher-income countries, where working conditions compare especially unfavourably to other forms of employment. In lower-income countries the situation is more benign, with seafaring characterised by relatively high wages and improving conditions. Indeed, seafarers are highly concentrated, with over 60% of EU/EEA seafarers employed in just five countries (Italy, Norway, Bulgaria, Poland and Croatia), and seafaring making up more than 1% of the labour market in just three (Croatia, Norway and Bulgaria).”

Outside the EU, seafaring has been predominantly strong in countries with long seafaring traditions, like the Philippines and India.

What is more, the sector is still faced with harsh violations of contracts and even abandonment of crews at sea.

Hundreds of cases have been reported over the years, with seafarers being denied paychecks, vessels running low on supplies and crews being unable to return to their homes.

ILO is running a database of abandonment cases since 2004.

Charity organizations and unions have been at the forefront of dealing with mental health and wellbeing issues of the seafarers.

Nevertheless, access to justice for seafarers and enforcement mechanisms as provided by the MLC, 2006, are not always available, especially in a cross-border setting. Finding a jurisdiction to claim one’s rights has also been costly for seafarers.

Given the current state of things, there is a lot more to be done on the international setting but also within each nation to protect seafarers’ rights and make the profession more attractive when it comes to social security.

Unfortunately, the overdue solution to the brewing crew crisis issue shows how difficult and slow these regulatory processes on a global scale can be.

The shipping industry’s transition into a greener, more sustainable future will require a fundamental change of its approach to recruiting as well.

Automation of shipping will not mean the end of seafaring.

On the contrary, automation of shipping is expected to usher in a more sophisticated environment for the seafarers and officers as they transition into shore-based centres for remote operation.

The industry stakeholders agree that some of the activities on board a ship might become remotely operated, but ships will never be fully autonomous, as it would be too dangerous to let these massive floating factories sail uncontrolled.

With this transition, better working conditions and faster and easier career advancement are expected to ensue. This will allow for more work and life balance, as some seafarers would be able to work from an office.

Nevertheless, with ships becoming more complex the requirements for seafarers and officers are increasing in complexity as well.

Operating modern equipment, cutting-edge software, and eventually, fuels of the future will require a higher level of education and training for seafarers so that operating all these systems can be done in a safe and effective manner.

On the other hand, access to technology and digitalization has not been universal, especially in the less developed countries that are often major crew suppliers.

Hence, defining what the skills of the future would be needed and providing training for seafarers moving forward will definitely be a challenge.

“Our view on recruitment should be radicalized in the next few years,” Belal Ahmed, Chairman of International Maritime Employers Council (IMEC), and Managing Director of Western Shipping Pte Ltd, said in a CapitalLink webinar.

“We have to change the basic level of requirements for seafarers.”

As such, ship owners and managers have to invest a great deal in educating and training their seafarers to bridge the gaps between what is required and what the level of knowledge of seafarers is.

And naturally, the cost of making that happen is increasing exponentially.

“We have to make the industry attractive and make sure we have a more diverse workforce, not only with regard to countries but also with regard to gender representation as women now account only for 5 per cent of the total seafaring workforce. If we are going to move into the future, we have to make sure we attract everybody!” Guy Platten, Secretary-General of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) said during CapitalLink’s webinar.

As pointed out, making the profession more attractive will require an immense focus on securing the welfare of seafarers and ensuring greater life and work balance.

“In ten years we will be operating new and different ships, and in that respect, we have to start preparing our workforce now in order to prepare for the future.”

In conclusion, it is up to the industry stakeholders to, by coming together as they have done so in this crew change crisis, promote the image of shipping as a modern workplace in order to attract the younger generations into the industry.

But first and foremost, the industry as a whole must show resilience and make sure the heart of the sector, its seafarers, can finally return home.

Therefore, it is paramount that national governments act on this issue, lift the restrictions and expedite seafarers’ repatriation.

By recognizing and appreciating their importance in these unprecedented times, we will instil a sense of hope for a brighter future of the sector.