EUROPEAN SEAFARER: R I P ?

Deaths can, as an American author famously experienced, be prematurely announced and obituaries often written while their subjects are still in the land of the living.

So the idea now gaining ground that the European seafarer is now on his or her deathbed might too be a false rumour, but if the subject is a certain kind of European the stories may be more credible.

Last month the head of fleet personnel at a leading shipmanager told a conference in Manila the current crisis had “killed off the north European seafarer”. At about the same time a poll on the website of Nautilus, the Anglo-Dutch officers’ (north European) union, resulted in a small majority (58% of 158 replies) answering in the negative to the question “Does the European seafarer have a long-term future?”

The distinction made by the shipmanager (a north European himself) is important. “European” can cover a wide range of nationalities: from Irish in the West to Russian in the East and from Icelanders in the North to Maltese in the South. In the context of shipping “North European” refers to “traditional maritime countries” such as the UK, Germany, The Netherlands, as well as those in Scandinavia.

Over the last 20 years seafarers from eastern and central Europe, including the Baltic States, have been increasingly employed by ship owners mainly but not exclusively in western and northern Europe, including Scandinavia. Poles, Russians and Ukrainians – all Europeans – are among the top nationalities in today’s crew lists from which the North Europeans are forecast to disappear.

With the exception of some domestic trades and specialist trades such as liquefied natural gas carriers, however, the manning of the world fleet will, according to the shipmanager, be dominated by nationalities from Asia, with China, The Philippines and India the main suppliers of labour.

The main reasons for the dwindling numbers of North European seafarers are by now familiar: earlier crises such as those of the 1970s and 1980s resulted in the loss of competitiveness that forced their employers to turn to new and cheaper sources; and the fading attraction of a seagoing career to young northwest Europeans.

Efforts – half-hearted, some might say – to reverse the decline by governments individually and through the European Union (EU) have had limited success. The current economic crisis, bigger than those before, has seen shipping companies aggressively cutting costs and replacing north Europeans with Asians. Last year, for example, sea-based workers’ remittances sent from Europe to The Philippines almost doubled to USD 1.1 billion.

The evidence pointing to terminal decline, however, is not conclusive. Earlier this year a survey of countries in the European Economic Area (the EU plus Norway, Liechtenstein and Iceland) suggested European officer numbers had, in fact, increased by 5% over the previous five years. The rise, unexpected perhaps, was attributed to improved recruitment tactics and higher investment in training.

The report, commissioned by the European Community Shipowners Association (ECSA), however, warned that the increase could be reversed as a result of the ageing of the workforce, many of whom are close to retirement. Last year the UK noted that 65% of its 11,400 certificated and active-at-sea officers were over 40 years old, with the figure for the 10,400 deck and engineroom ratings higher at 72%.

The EEA controls almost 42% of the world fleet in gross tonnage terms (almost 23% registered in EEA countries) and, according to ECSA, its shipping industry provides, in addition to 126,000 jobs ashore, 470,000 jobs at sea but only 165,000 or just over a third are held by EEA nationals.

Similarly, the recently published update of the BIMCO/ISF manpower survey suggests that the number of officers from Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, including most of Europe, has increased significantly to 184,000 or almost 30% of the world total of 624,000. While the rise in numbers, now based on holders on STCW certificates, may be due to increased training, the latest report cautions that certificate-holders may include those who are no longer active at sea (working ashore, for example).

The report is based mainly on country-supplied data but also includes figures based on responses from around 100 companies: these put the number of OECD officers at less than 10% of the total. The caveat here is that the companies responding may not be fully representative of all those employing OECD officers.

The BIMCO/ISF report also warns that, while the decline in the number of OECD officers may have been temporarily halted, demographic trends and the 10 years it can take to produce a senior officer mean it is likely the trend to source from the Indian subcontinent and the Far East will continue.

With European governments distracted by more pressing issues, it will take loud voices to remind them of the implications of a decline in the number of their seafarers. These have already been spelled out but will no doubt be stressed again by the European Commission’s taskforce under Sir Robert Coleman when it reports next year: the dangers of over-reliance on non-European seafarers in manning not just European-flag ships but ships of any flag carrying European trade, including imports of vital energy supplies; and the gradual loss of maritime skills.

As ECSA has acknowledged, however, any government action will be influenced by the need to maintain the competitiveness of European shipping. Balancing strategic and economic needs, particularly in a time of both austerity and geopolitical uncertainty, will be a challenging task.

With government spending being ruthlessly cut, any support for training and employing nationals at sea will be difficult to justify. European seafarers, like their counterparts in other OECD countries, will be increasingly at the mercy of forces beyond their control.

Even if their governments are able to produce policies that help recruitment and training, decisions already taken by European companies to increase their reliance on non-OECD officers will be difficult to reverse. Reports of the death of the European seafarer may be greatly exaggerated but the patient is clearly in need of intensive care.