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Shipowners, seafarers’ unions and maritime employer groups are establishing their own approved international network of quarantine facilities to ensure seafarers can safely join ships despite unpredictable government border policies
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#CrewEQUIP will create a list of trusted hotels available for crew quarantines that will be independently reviewed
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Facilities must meet #CrewEQUIP’s stringent standards for hygiene, testing integrity and data security
Shipowners, seafarers’ unions and maritime employer groups are establishing their own approved international network of quarantine facilities to ensure seafarers can safely join ships despite unpredictable changes to government border policies.
The move comes as the Omicron variant spurs governments to close their borders to seafarers needing to leave and join ships, according to a news release from the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS).
The Crew Enhanced Quarantine International Program (#CrewEQUIP) is a partnership between the International Maritime Employers’ Council (IMEC), ICS and International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF). Collectively, the organizations represent more than 80% of the global merchant fleet and nearly one million international seafarers through almost 200 affiliated unions.
#CrewEQUIP will create a list of trusted and independently reviewed hotels available for crew quarantines. The program is designed to overcome frequent changes in government border policies affecting international crew by having the highest standards and industry-best protocols in place. This will ensure the scheme will continue to safely get crew to vessels even if governments increase their quarantine requirements, the groups said.
The program is urgently needed to avoid the shipping industry returning to the worst extremes of the crew change crisis, which saw 400,000 seafarers trapped working aboard vessels beyond their initial contracts in late 2020, with an equivalent number unable to join vessels and earn income, they added.
The groups said #CrewEQUIP will be in place in the meantime to support greater levels of crew change even as they called for the urgent creation of a global, permanent system with digital vaccine and testing recognition.
Under the #CrewEQUIP scheme, shipping companies and their representatives such as crewing agents and vessel managers are able to sponsor pre-embarkation quarantine facilities for seafarers to be considered for recognition.
Facilities must meet #CrewEQUIP’s stringent standards for hygiene, testing integrity and data security.
A facility must also pass inspections by Lloyd’s Register, the program’s recognized external auditor, to become and remain recognized #CrewEQUIP providers.
The online booking portal to nominate pre-embarkation quarantine facilities was supposed to be launched on crewequip.org. However, as of this writing, the site is not yet operational.
Guy Platten, ICS secretary general, said: “#CrewEquip will make the quarantine process smoother for both seafarers and shipowners and ensure high standards are upheld. However, world leaders need to urgently provide a long-term solution to ensure that seafarers are no longer unduly impacted by ever-changing travel and quarantine restrictions.”
IMEC chairman Captain Belal Ahmed said: “This new quarantine facility programme will give industry more confidence to support the movement of more seafarers more regularly around the world safe in the knowledge that there is a considerably less risk of Covid-19 being introduced to a vessel if a seafarer has joined via a CrewEquip-approved facility, where the highest standards will prevail.”
Photo by Mufid Majnun on Unsplash
