Concentrated Inspection Campaign on ISM Compliance - September to November 2007

The 27 Maritime Authorities (EU Members plus Canada, Croatia, Iceland, Norway and the Russian Federation) of the Paris Memorandum of Understanding on Port State Control will start a concentrated inspection campaign focussing on compliance with the ISM code – 5 years after its global implementation on board ships. The inspection campaign will last 3 months, ending on 30 November 2007.

In practice the concentrated inspection campaign will mean that during every port State control inspection within the Paris MOU region, the safety management system shall be verified in more detail for compliance with the international standards. Port State Control Officers will verify that the safety management system (SMS) on board is not a “paper exercise” but that the master is “fully conversant” with the SMS and ship’s personnel are able to “communicate effectively” in the execution of their duties related to the SMS.

The previous ISM campaigns in 1998 and 2002 were mainly carried out to verify if a SMS was established on board. The purpose of the present campaign is to verify the effective implementation of the SMS on board.

This campaign will be carried out in parallel with the Tokyo MOU on Port State Control.

During the campaign Port State Control Officers shall use a list of 12 selected items to verify critical areas of the management system, some of which are related to:

·          Documentation

·          Critical equipment/systems

·          Maintenance

·          Communication

When deficiencies are found, sanctions by the port State may vary from recording a non-conformity and instructing the master to rectify within 3 months to “major non-conformities” which may lead to the detention of the ship until all deficiencies have been rectified.

In case of detention, the ship could face the risk of further inspections in other Paris MOU ports and publication in the monthly list of detentions issued by the Secretariat of the Paris MOU.

It is expected that the ParisMOU will carry out approximately 4500 inspections during the CIC.

All inspections will be inserted in the SIRENAC database of the Paris MOU and will be recorded on an evaluation form. The results of the campaign shall be analysed later this year. Detailed results of the campaign will be discussed during the 41st meeting of the Paris MOU Port State Control Committee in May 2008 in Greece.

For 2008 a concentrated inspection campaign has been planned which will focus on Navigation - SOLAS Chapter V, including Voyage Data Recorder, Automatic Identification System and Electronic Chart Display and Information System.

(From Paris MOU press release of 27.08.2007)