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PHILIPPINE maritime authorities have failed to secure a
training ship that Japanese shipyard operator Tsuneishi
Heavy Industries had offered for the use of the local
industry after training centers failed to hold a
dialogue on how to use the vessel.
Tsuneishi eventually sold the vessel since there were no
takers from the maritime industry, according to Vicente
T. Suazo Jr., administrator of the Maritime Industry
Authority, or Marina.
“I have
already told Pami [Philippine Association of Maritime
Institutions] to discuss how to go about… [using the
vessel] and [that] we will help…[on] legal issues on
how to bring the ship to the Philippines, such as using
the Bareboat charter law,” Suazo said in an interview.
“But I
never got… [any] feedback out of it and Tsuneishi was
forced to sell it rather than maintaining the vessel
with no one using it,” he added.
Suazo
explained that the Japanese offered the vessel, which
can accommodate up to 600 cadets, provided it would be
used for training purposes and that, in return, those
who will take charge of it pay either the Japanese
government or the shipyard operator a minimal fee.
Tsuneishi has a local unit in Cebu.
Japan
is home to one of the world’s top shipping companies. It
has bought several training vessels to train Japanese
who want to enter the seafaring professions. However,
there were quite a few among
Japan’s
aging population and the new-generation Japanese who
were keen on becoming seafarers. The training vessels
were rendered useless and ended up dry-docked.
Suazo
said he will ask Tsuneishi if there are remaining
vessels it wants to dispose of and will again get in
touch with various maritime schools in the country.
These schools, Suazo added, are having a hard time
securing shipboard slots to graduates of either Bachelor
in Science (BS) Marine Transportation or BS Marine
Engineering.
Tsuneishi, whose local unit is partly owned by the
Abotiz family, still has four available vessels that are
up for sale or rent.
A marine
cadet needs to put in three to four years of classroom
work, plus a year of shipboard classes, in order to
graduate.
Shipboard slots are scarce these days as vessels could
only accommodate two to four cadets for deck and engine
works at any given time. International shipping vessels,
on the other hand, only take in the cadets in the top
tier of their class and usually hire them at the end of
shipboard training.
A vessel
dedicated to training maritime students could lessen the
pressure on shipping firms to accept more cadets.
The
Philippines is a major supplier of seafarers worldwide,
and Filipinos account for about 30 percent of the
maritime population.
A
shortage of maritime officers also places manning
agencies in the country under a lot of pressure to meet
the demand of shipping firms for qualified and competent
Filipinos to manage their vessels. |
