Media Release
Australia's rising ship detention rate proves success of risk-based inspections
The number of ships detained by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority
increased last year as a result of AMSA’s world leading risked-based inspection
system for identifying substandard foreign flag vessels visiting Australian
ports.
AMSA inspected 2,827 foreign flag ships last year and detained 190 vessels until major safety problems were fixed.
AMSA's 2003 Port State Control report shows the detention rate climbed
to 6.7 per cent in 2003, compared to
5.8 per cent in 2002 and 4.4 per cent in 2001, indicating greater efficiency
in singling-out substandard ships.
AMSA’s Chief Executive Officer, Clive Davidson, said while the detention rate had increased, there had been a general improvement in overall vessel standards as shown by the lower number of deficiencies per ship inspection. In 2003, 2.4 deficiencies were identified per ship compared to 2.7 in 2002 and 3 in 2001.
"The higher detention rate continues to reflect AMSA's risk management strategy introduced in 2001 to target inspection resources at high risk ships. These have a greater probability of being below standard and are more likely to be detained until major defects are remedied," Mr Davidson said.
"One of the principal aims of port State control is to encourage substandard ships to improve their performance or force them to leave the industry. AMSA's world leading risk-based targeting system is raising pressure on the lower end of the shipping market not only in Australia, but also overseas."
The latest AMSA figures follow the recent release of the Annual Report on Port State Control in the Asia-Pacific Region, which shows that Australia has the highest inspection rate of the 18 members of the Tokyo Memorandum of Understanding on Port State Control.
The Asia-Pacific report shows Australia inspected 84per cent of eligible ships in 2003, compared with 81 per cent for the Russian Federation’s Pacific ports and 46 per cent for Chile.
"The quality of shipping in the Asia-Pacific is steadily improving and AMSA is working with our regional partners on capacity building to improve ship inspection techniques, encourage adoption of risk based inspection targeting and share ship inspection data," Mr Davidson said.
"In May this year, the Paris Memorandum of Understanding on Port State Control covering the European and North Atlantic region decided to scrap its 25 per cent across-the-board ship inspection rate in favour of a risk based approach."
"Australia has led the way in the development of risk based ship inspection and now it is spreading to other regional organisations with the same aim of more efficient use of resources to drive out substandard shipping."
AMSA’s 2003 port State control report is available at: www.amsa.gov.au
The Tokyo MOU 2003 report is available at www.tokyo-mou.org
Further information:
Ben Mitchell, 0418 164 901