Singapore: The global officer shortage could be solved if legislators enforced owners to take a minimum number of cadets onboard, say senior executives at Singapore's Thome Ship Management.
'There would be no more officer shortage worldwide,' maintained Capt Michael Elwert, Thome's head of group HR and crewing, 'if every ship took two cadets onboard like Thome does.'
During the recession many owners have pulled cadets from their ships in a bid to cut costs. In the tanker sector in particular there is a growing recruitment crunch for senior officers.
Now is the time to get flag states or even the International Maritime Organisation to enforce onboard cadet training, urged Capt Bjorn Hojgaard, Thome's md in an interview with Seatrade Asia Online yesterday. 'This would be a moment where regulation would serve a good purpose in the industry to make ships over a certain size take cadets onboard,' Hojgaard said.
Thome, which now has 115 ships under full technical management, sources 75% of its 7,500 crew from the Philippines. To this end, it is expanding its Manila training centre and in the past month has opened a branch office in the central Visayas city of Iloilo to expand recruitment. [26/11/09]
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