IMO chief addresses shipping’s role in society

IMO chief addresses shipping’s role in society    Shipping has an important role to play in the broader issues affecting global society, International Maritime Organization Secretary-General Efthimios Mitropoulos told delegates at the opening of the IMO's 24th assembly session Monday in London.
   'I strongly believe that their inherent problems are ones to which we, as the regulators of and, indeed, as members of the international maritime community, can play an active role in finding the solutions ' or, at the very least, in making a valuable and beneficial contribution,' Mitropoulos said, referring to wealth imbalance, security and the environment.
   Mitropoulos pledged IMO's contribution to meeting the Millennium Development Goals, which have been agreed by members of the United Nations.
   While the technical, detailed work of IMO is hugely important, Mr. Mitropoulos said that the assembly provided an appropriate occasion to view IMO's work, and the contribution of shipping as a whole, in the context of the broader issues affecting the world.
   'Maritime activity has a key role to play in achieving (the alleviation of poverty),' he said. 'It already provides an important source of invisible income to many developing countries. Indeed, developing countries now lead the world in some of shipping's most important ancillary businesses, including the registration of ships, the supply of sea-going manpower and ship recycling. They also play a significant part in shipowning and operating, shipbuilding, repairing and recycling, and port services.
   'Sea transport remains by far the most cost-effective way to move goods and raw materials in quantity around the world and, as I have stressed at every opportunity this year, the vast majority of global trade is carried, safely and securely, in ships.'
      Key issues on the assembly agenda, according to Mitropoulos, include a proposed resolution requesting the IMO Marine Environment Protection Committee to develop, as a priority, a new instrument on ship recycling, with a view to providing legally-binding and globally-applicable ship recycling regulations for the international shipping industry and for recycling facilities.
   Another draft resolution addresses the problem of piracy and armed robbery against ships in waters off the coast of Somalia.