IN THIS ISSUE
1. Undeclared Deck Cargo
2. Agitprop Posters at the Hong Kong Maritime Museum
3. London over Uber
4. Safe Packing of Containers
5. Movers and Shakers
6. People and Places
FOB Network News
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1. Undeclared Deck Cargo
The latest instalment of DMC’s Case Notes written by Pak Hei Li, LLB(Hons), PCLL (University of Hong Kong) relates to the decision of the Federal Court of Canada in Ontario in the case of De Wolf Maritime Safety BV v Traffic-Tech International Inc. (The “Zagora”). In this case the Court decided that cargo carried on-deck, undeclared as such, was still to be considered as “goods” under the Hague-Visby Rules. Hence, the Hague-Visby Rules still applied in this scenario and the carrier could rely on the limitation of liability as stipulated in Article IV(5)(a).
2. Agitprop Posters at the Hong Kong Maritime Museum
Friends at the HKMM have passed us a copy of the illustrated lecture by its director,Richard Lesley, on the evolution of the maritime propoganda poster in China. Your editor, who studied Mandarin in the mid 1970s. spent his fair share of time scrutinising such things in an effort to understand Maoist China. Interesting.
http://tinyurl.com/proppostersmaritimo
3. London over Uber
We suppose many of our readers have had cause to jump in a London taxi at some time or another. Black cabs are best but by no means cheap. In recent days we have learned that the transport authority for London, tfl, has not renewed the cab network Uber’s license, to the consternation of its many users. Is this a victory for the vested interests of the black cab lobby? Is it a piece with the tendency in these islands which has brought us Brexit, minority government and a feeling that nothing lasts for long? Our favourite publication on the transport scene in the capital, called London Reconnections, has published on this subject, far from our salt sprayed maritime concerns, but somehow linked with our thoughts about the future:-
https://www.londonreconnections.com/2017/understanding-uber-not-app/
4. Safe Packing of Containers
Anne Kappel of the World Shipping Council writes:-
A coalition of leading cargo industry organisations representing the full breadth of the global supply chain is maintaining its campaign for safer practices in packing freight containers and other cargo transport units (CTUs). During a meeting held at the IMO during London International Shipping Week, the group asked delegates of IMO member states for the backing of their governments to communicate the content, to encourage and oversee the use of the IMO/ILO/UNECE Code of Practice for Packing of Cargo Transport Units (CTU Code) within their jurisdictions.
The four industry bodies, Global Shippers Forum (GSF), ICHCA International, TT Club and World Shipping Council (WSC) participated in the experts group that created the comprehensive guidance for safe and secure packing of CTUs and was thereafter adopted by each of the UN agencies during 2014. As such, the key stakeholders in the intermodal supply chain together with the leading freight industry insurer continue to drive forward the implementation of this important work.
Credible statistics are hard to come by, partly due to a lack of engagement by state authorities with IMO’s container inspection standard, but ICHCA International’s Richard Brough made an attempt to estimate the extent of the problem based on UNCTAD trade statistics and the results of the relatively few inspections made during the last fifteen years. “Extrapolating from the UNCTAD figure of 180 million TEUs traded, via the 24% of inspected containers carrying dangerous goods (DG) that were found to be badly packed and bearing in mind that cargoes declared as DG make up only around 10% of all containers, we can estimate that each year some 25.9 million containers are potentially poorly packed and pose a danger at some point on their journey along the supply chain.”
Tthe full CTU Code can be found here:-
http://www.imo.org/en/OurWork/Safety/Cargoes/CargoSecuring/Pages/CTU-Code.aspx
5. Movers and Shakers
Your editor grew up in a peripatetic life as a “military brat”, dependent upon a father who was posted to US Air Force bases in all kinds of places in the world. Every 18 months or so a government-contracted firm like Mayflower would arrive and pack our household up for shipping to pastures new. Not exactly the high end of the removals business, somewhat unlike the posher market described by Finn Murphy in Longreads as the beauty and burdens of the long haul removals business. A very good piece of writing.
6. People and Places
Nayana Nandkumar has written in to remind us that the Gala Dinner of the Dubai Shipping Agents Association takes place on Wednesday, 18th October. 2017 at the Roda al Bustan Hotel near Dubai Airport from 7.30 pm onwards. The fees are DHS. 500/- per person and DHS. 4500/- for a table of 10.
Deadline for confirmation is 30th Sept. 2017
Contact:-
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Anette Rey has joined GEODIS as Group Communications Director on September 4th.
She arrives from Biopharma Company Bristol-Myers Squibb where she held the position of Vice President, Public Affairs and Communications. A French-German binational, Anette Rey started her career at the Luxembourg and London offices of RTL Group, prior to joining Ubisoft in 2003 as Vice President, Global Communications. In 2011 Anette Rey joined Air Liquide, where she served as VP External Communications until 2014 after having managed corporate communications for the global industrial branch.
Anette holds a PhD in Political Science from the Albert-Ludwigs-University in Freiburg, Germany, as well as Masters and Post-Graduate degrees from Sciences-Po, Paris.
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Bolero International, the e-b/l and trade finance digitisation pioneer has appointed Andrew Raymond as its new global head of sales.
Raymond joins Bolero after seven years with financial software and technology services company FIS (formerly known as SunGard), where he led the sales team for the risk and compliance business in EMEA. His extensive experience includes 17 years in Singapore working in senior positions for companies in the financial sector including SunGard, Algorithmics, Misys and SmartStream. Raymond is a US Citizen and holds a BS in International Business and an MBA in Finance.
From the Avo Archive
The website of this newsletter contains all the editorial material since the inception of the Maritime Advocate as a print based quarterly in 1997 under the founding aegis of John Guy, Chris Hewer and Manfred Arnold. Readers can go to the site and search the database on the home page in its entirety. If you are looking for an old case, an old controversy or you would just like to see how many times you and your firm have featured in our annals feel free to access the archive. It is like this e-zine, free to Readers and we always appreciate the support of advertisers and sponsors.
We found many referenes to taxis in our search of the archive. This one in Issue 150 of 6th of April 2004:-
Fare comment
A PASSENGER in a taxi tapped the driver on the shoulder to ask him how long it would take to reach his destination. The driver screamed, lost control of the cab, nearly hit a bus, drove over the curb, and stopped just inches from a large plate glass window.
For a few moments everything was silent in the cab, then the driver said, “Please, don’t ever do that again. You scared the daylights out of me.” The passenger, who was also frightened, apologised and said he hadn’t realised that a tap on the shoulder could frighten him so much. The driver replied, “I’m sorry, it’s really not your fault at all. Today is my first day driving a cab. I have been driving a hearse for the last 25 years.”
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In this week
LOOKING back over history, a lot has happened in the first week of April. In 1877, for example, the first telephone was placed in a private home in Boston, although nobody, presumably, was able to ring it. In 1832, Vitamin C was isolated. It is time to welcome it back – 172 years is long enough. And, just this week, Norway confirmed plans to create a level playing field on tonnage tax. That makes one hundred and thirty-seven such plans in Europe. So far. This month.
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Statistics alert
THE Central Union of Marine Underwriters in Oslo has warned the insurance market against becoming obsessed by statistics. We agree, 87.3 per cent.
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Poem of the Week
SURVIVOR
Everyday,
I think about dying.
About disease, starvation,
Violence, terrorism, war,
The end of the world.
It helps
Keep my mind off things.
(Roger McGough)
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Best Question-and-Answer Session of the Week Involving Cats
Q: Our cat, who is thirty-five, spends all her time in bed. She follows every move I make, and this is beginning to get to me. She never seems sleepy, nor particularly happy. Is there anything I could give her?
A: There are no medicines which can safely be given to induce felicity in a cat, but you might try lettuce, which is a soporific, for the wakefulness. I would have to see the cat watching you to tell whether anything could be done to divert her attention.
(James Thurber)
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Best Cat Headlines of the Week
Bespoke survey cat hits the road (Maritime Journal)
New York cat crash (Tradewinds Today)
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Best Shipping Headline of the Week involving Royalty
One arrested after Wartsila tax probe (Fairplay)
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Best Understatement Headline of the Week
Everton fire unfortunate for Polembros (Fairplay)
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Best Comment in a National Coastguard Agency Ship Detention Report
Classification society: None (MCA, UK)
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Best Question-and-Answer Sessions of the Week
Q: What do the letters “HTML” stand for in computer terminology?
A: Uniform Resource Locator.
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Q: What word beginning with “H” describes the longest side of a right-angled triangle?
A: Hexagon
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Q: “The Tales of Robin Hood” are set in which English city?
A: Sherwood Forest
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Q: Which word, when put before “Top”, forms a popular phrase describing a circus?
A: Hat
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Q: Which word beginning with “P” describes the condescending attitude sometimes adopted by men towards women in the workplace?
A: Platonic
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Q: The name of which of the North American Great Lakes sounds like another word for “creepy” or “frightening”?
A: Weird
(The Weakest Link, BBC TV)
Fruits of the Earth
Mel and his wife are walking down Main Street one evening.
They stop at a jewellery store window.
She says, “Mel, I’d love those diamond earrings.”
He says, “no problem,” and takes a brick out of his pocket, smashes the window, and gets the earrings for her.
They walk away hastily and soon come upon another jewellery store.
In the window, there is this gorgeous diamond ring, and the wife says, “Mel, oh please, please, please, get me that ring.”
He looks around, sees there’s nobody around, takes a brick out of his pocket and hurls it at the window.
Now she’s got the earrings and this great ring, and they walk away … until they come to yet another jewellery store.
There’s this fantastic diamond necklace in the window.
She starts begging, “Mel, Mel, just look at it. I need it!”
He looks at her and says “Whaddaya think, I’m made out of bricks?”
[Paul Dixon]
The Contemplation of Marriage
Men and women have two distinct views about a wedding.
The husband to be wakes up in the morning, plays a round of golf and counts the minutes until he has to be at the altar.
The wife to be, on the other hand, wakes up in the morning and is panicking.
She immediately begins to organize things, making sure everything is in proper order.
In her mind she is repeating what she has to do. “All I have to do is go down the aisle, get to the altar, and marry him.”
She repeats this over and over again, until she begins to shorten it to three words which she continues to repeat… “Aisle, altar, him.” “Aisle, altar, him.” “Aisle, altar, him.”