Asia/Pacific News
Singapore's Crew Change Success Underlines Maritime Sector Resilience
The 'safe corridor' instigated by the Singapore port authorities to faciliate the changing of ships' crew under Covid-19 has been heralded as a success.
Marking the Singapore Register of Ships (SRS) arrival at 96 million gross tonnage, the chief executive of the Maritime and Port Authority said since March 27, over 50,000 crew changes had happened at Singapore.
Quah Ley Hoon said that this acheivement underlined the resilience of the country's marine economy.
"The maritime sector including the Port of Singapore has remained resilient even with Covid-19," she said.
"Our container throughput registered a 3.7% growth in September this year compared to the same month last year [and] bunkering volumes [are] 5.6% higher from January to September this year, compared to the same period last year."
Average sign ons and sign offs for crew are running at betwee 500 to 600 a day while 99% of crew onbard are with their service contract period.
Quay said that the SRS is looking at how to improve its services and would be undergoing a strategic review "in the coming year".
