Officer Shortage in Shipping
The international shipping industry will require an additional 42,500 officers by the end of 2019 to cope with the expected growth in the main cargo carrying fleet, according to the latest manning report published by global shipping consultancy Drewry.
The analysis was made according to the expected growth in the main cargo carrying fleet, which is equivalent to 7 percent over the five year period. The analysts say that the large number of officers have needed to satisfy the expected growth in shipping.
Current officer supply is in the order of 615,000 and a nominal shortfall of approximately 15,000 officers, which is expected to remain the case until 2019. In the meantime, this shortfall is made up by officers working longer shift patterns, Drewry says.
The problems with lack of employees will solve by entering in exploitation of largest and more effective ships.
“There is still a shortage of officers but the gap between demand and supply has narrowed as the recent growth in fleet size is coming to an end. It is also the case that ships are getting bigger and larger ships provide more shipping capacity for the same number of vessels. Drewry believes that this is also helping to ease some of the pressure on manning,” Drewry said.
Drewry noted that although crew compensation packages tend to follow the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) standard terms, officer earnings are more market driven – West Europe is however the principle exception to the rule.
