Lloyd's List Tuesday October 20 1998No. 57,096Page 5
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Kinnock hails tanker
owners
Intertanko has earned respect for its high standards, but for how
long?
Tony Gray assesses the implications of last week's Intertanko
Brussels Tanker Event
IT'S official - tanker owners are a good thing.
European transport commissioner Neil Kinnock more or less said as much when
delivering a ringing endorsement of the industry's efforts to raise safety
standards through Intertanko.
"I am sure that Intertanko will maintain
its invaluable commitment to the Quality Shipping Campaign," the commissioner
told an appreciative audience of Intertanko members.
"Indeed, I can
foresee even stronger links between our two organisations developing as the
campaign advances. I look forward to that."
Kinnock: recognition
Mr Kinnock's praise for Intertanko's work was returned in full by the
independent tanker owners' organisation.
"We fully support his goals,"
said Richard du Moulin, chairman of the independent
tanker owners'
organisation.
"We look forward to strengthening our ties with the
commission in the years
ahead."
Slater: essential role
This
mutual admiration society came dangerously close to smugness. And a timely
warning against hubris came with last week's allegations that a vessel operated
by Intertanko member Pegasus had spilled 2,300 gallons of oil in the sensitive
San Francisco Bay area.
But tankers owners have earned the respect of
regulatory authorities, and it would be churlish to darken their moment in the
sun.
For too long, the industry was considered public enemy number one,
endangering the seas and wildlife with old rustbuckets and poorly-trained crews
du Moulin: strengthening ties
In recent years, however, the
industry's safety record has come on in leaps and bounds.
These days
articles in the press about pollution are more likely to be detailing the
misdemeanours of cruiseships rather than tankers.
And the tanker
industry's performance must now be the envy of colleagues in the dry bulk
sector, whose ships continue to sink with alarming regularity.
Cynics may
argue that tanker owners had to be kick-started by US legislation and
charterers' inspection regimes, but Intertanko clearly deserves much of the
credit for the industry's improved reputation.
Its quality criteria for
membership rests on three substantial pillars. Members must have:
pollution
insurance through a recognised P&I club; l classification by a member of the
International Association of Classification Societies; and ISM Code
certification.
Intertanko is entitled to take pride in the fact that all
its members were ISM-compliant by the time the code entered into force on July
1, 1998.Of course, not all tanker owners are members of Intertanko, but the
number of rogues violating the rules must now be quite small.
Intertanko
embraces a substantial 74% of all independently-owned tanker tonnage. Add the
three large fleets of non-members Frontline, World-Wide and Maersk, it is clear
that at least 80% of tanker tonnage is being operated within the framework of
high safety standards.
Mr Kinnock's positive remarks are an important
recognition by the outside world of the industry's achievement.
And
Intertanko and the commission are like-minded in their determination to raise
the industry's profile.
Shipping remains an intensely private industry,
both in terms of its ownership and operations.
The result is that
shipping is rarely at the centre of attention unless tragedy strikes.
Mr
Kinnock wants this to change.
"I believe it is essential to increase the
visibility of shipping as a means of emphasising its crucial importance to every
economy and in order to help to shape public policy.
"The reason is
simple. It is much more likely that there will be greater efficiency in the
other parts of the transport chain which connect with shipping and better
standards of infrastructure and services that relate to shipping if there is a
general public and political awareness of the real significance of shipping for
economic performance and civilised social and living conditions."
Given
we have for decades been living in what could legitimately be dubbed the 'age of
oil' the tanker industry's low profile does appear anomalous.
Any doubts
about the vital role tankers play in keeping our lights on and our cars motoring
were met head on by Paul Slater, the chairman of Intertanko's public relations
committee.
The tanker industry was, he said, "arguably the single most
important activity in the lives of every European citizen".
Mr Slater's
words focused on Europe because the Intertanko conference was designed around
its relationship with Brussels. However, they could equally apply to other
regions of the world.
Indeed, Mr Slater's speech, which attempted to do
justice to the "essential role" of tanker transportation in Europe's economic
framework, appeared to be directed at a wider audience than those members of the
tanker fraternity which largely comprised his audience.
He produced a
host of eye-catching statistcs regarding the oil and tanker industries which
surely could not have failed to impress even the most hard-core environmentalist
or government official.
Oil is the world's most strategic commodity,
accounting for 40% of total world energy consumption.
Crude oil and oil
products represent no less than 45% of global seaborne trade, employing 3,400
tankers of more than 10,000 dwt.
Impressive figures, but by no means
new.
The novelty of Mr Slater's speech came in the number-crunching he
and Intertanko had done on tax revenues associated with crude oil imports.
Incredibly, a 280,000 tonne crude cargo worth around $19m will have $115m in tax
added to it by the UK government before the refined product reaches the
consumer. Suffer the poor
motorist.
Mr Slater continued: "In a full
year, the UK government generates some $21bn in tax on imported crude oil and we
estimate that the total annual tax revenue raised in Europe by the importation
of crude oil is more than $200bn.
"I could argue that we tanker owners
don't simply carry oil, we carry tax revenues."
Jokes about VLTCs - very
large tax carriers - aside, it would need only a small chunk of this tax revenue
to be ring-fenced for supporting the tanker industry to further improve the
overall safety record.
Mr Slater offered a rollcall of the shore-based
services beyond the owners' control that also need to be performing up to
scratch if accidents are to be avoided:
pilots properly trained and
certified; accurate charts and properly dredged channels and harbours; vessel
traffic information and control systems; sufficient tugs with sufficent power;
adequate accident response programmes and facilities; slop reception facilities;
and uniform enforcement of existing rules and regulations.
Mr Slater
concluded: "Given the financial aspects of each voyage it is essential that all
of these services and facilities are available in every European port and
waterway and we believe that by protecting the flow of tax revenues we will
automatically protect the environment."
Intertanko is right to press home
the importance of raising the quality of shore-based functions.
As Mr
Slater pointed out, the Sea Empress spill in Milford Haven in 1996 demonstrated
that an owner can operate quality tonnage with a highly-trained crew and yet
still be vulnerable to the effects of shore-based inefficiency.
Having
got its own house in order, the organisation is entitled to demand that others
do too.
Mr du Moulin said that tankers now account for less than 5% of
port state detentions, and that Intertanko members were responsible for 25% of
these - or not much more than 1% of the total.
The organisation is aware
of the need to be ever-vigilant, however.
Just one major oil spill in
which an Intertanko member has been shown to be negligent could undo all the
good work.
LLP Limited 1998