Pains Wessex has attended the World Maritime Technology Conference (WMTC) in Mumbai and held talks with leading figures in the Indian shipping industry.
Managing director Robert Hill was a delegate at the WMTC, which is organised in partnership with 25 of the world’s leading maritime associations and held every three years. Mr Hill says, “The conference brings together marine industry professionals from various countries to exchange ideas on the latest developments in the maritime world and discuss ways of working more closely.”
Alongside the conference was an exhibition featuring the best of international and Indian marine technology. India’s leading ship survival equipment supplier and Pains Wessex distributor AS Moloobhoy took part and showed its range of safety equipment.
During the WMTC meetings were arranged between Pains Wessex, the director general of the Ministry of Shipping and the nautical surveyor of Indian shipping by Nafeesa Moloobhoy, managing partner for AS Moloobhoy. Discussions centred on control of imported product to meet international standards of SOLAS (safety of life at sea) and MED (marine equipment directive).
Pains Wessex is also leading the call for stricter policing of European marine equipment safety standards. Mr Hill told a meeting of the EU Commission/European Marine Safety Agency that product quality was not monitored closely enough, which could result in substandard goods slipping through.
He said, “The European Marine Safety Agency shares this frustration and will be producing a written proposal to tighten product surveillance in the marketplace by mid-2009. Two years later, it could then become an EU directive with powers to enforce.”
The next WMTC is being held in 2012 in St Petersburg.