Without the seafarers of the world, the global economy would stop on its tracks. About 90 percent of world commerce is transported by sea, on board 50,000 merchant ships, registered in some 150 countries, and manned by about 1.2 million seafarers of various nationalities.

The merchant shipowners altogether earn an average annual income of US$380 billion, which is five percent of the world economy. The average annual profit of an individual merchant shipowner is US$5.42 million, but only about US$636,000 goes to the seafarers as wages, showing a clean 800 percent profit in relation to wages. For example, a capesize vessel, the Anangel Happiness has secured a hire rate which would repay her purchase cost in a mere five years, while the working life of the vessel could span 25 years.

Wages of the crew are always kept at a minimum to maintain the level of profit. This is coupled with the high risks, extreme conditions and hardships entailed by work at sea. Despite the strategic importance of seafarers to world commerce, they are among the most exploited and oppressed of workers.

The working conditions and dangers of seafaring are also worsened by the shipowners’ scheme of resorting to “flags of convenience” or FOCs. As the ship is considered an extension of the flag state, the working conditions on board are supposed to be governed by the labor laws and standards of the country where a ship is registered and whose flag it is flying. Under the FOC system, the real shipowners create dummy corporations and register the vessel in some small states like the Bahamas, Honduras, Liberia, Panama, Costa Rica, Marshall Islands, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, to name a few.

According to Franz Fischler, Commissioner of the European Union’s Fisheries Commission, “The practice of flags of convenience, where owners register vessels in countries other than their own in order to avoid binding regulations or controls, is a serious menace to today’s maritime world.”

These FOC countries do not care about the labor conditions on board nor the shipworthiness of the ships flying their flags. This allows the prevalence of substandard shipping and the proliferation of floating coffins across the seas. It also deepens the exploitation of seafarers who are made to accept very low wages and to work under extreme and dangerous conditions on board their vessels.

The Filipino seafarers, comprising a quarter of the world crew, are among the most exploited and oppressed workers under the FOC system. Existing benefits and rights of Filipino seafarers are being watered down and diminished to make them more “competitive” against new entrants from the former eastern block and other third world countries. The Philippine government treats seafarers as commodities and joins other third world governments in a race to the bottom.

Through the years, organized unions of seafarers under the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) struggled to fight the FOC system. A worldwide boycott of FOCs was organized in the early 1950s and later, industrial actions were taken to impose standard collective agreements on FOC ships. ITF inspectors ensure the implementation of ITF Collective Agreements which set the wages and working conditions for FOC ships. They are assigned in major seaports to board and arrest FOC ships that violate international labor laws.

Many Filipino seafarers, with the help of ITF inspectors, were able to fight for decent wages and acceptable working conditions through collective crew actions and strikes, and detention or arrests of ships. The detention and arrest of vessels for violations of various labor standards, safety, and other reasons have increased during the past years. In the European Union, detention of ships rose from 844 in 2005, to 1,174 in 2006, and to 1,280 in 2007.

The International Labor Organization (ILO) takes effort to maintain international standards with the passage of 70 conventions on maritime labor. This is also to lessen the exploitation and oppression of seafarers, especially under the FOC system. But under the ILO rules, these conventions are only binding to countries that have ratified. The Philippines, for example, has only ratified four of the 70 ILO Conventions and has not signed and ratified the rest. Similarly, most FOC states also refuse to sign and ratify these maritime conventions.

This has led the ITF, the ILO, seafarers’ organizations and other stakeholders in the maritime industry to adopt a superconvention that would cover and consolidate the existing conventions. On February 23, 2006, the Governing Body of the ILO in its 94th session adopted the Maritime Labor Convention. Known as the MLC 2006, it is a single and coherent instrument embodying the current maritime labor standards, and the fundamental principles of other labor conventions. In its preamble, it states that given the global nature of the shipping industry, seafarers need special protection.

The MLC 2006 sets out standards on seafarers’ rights and addresses issues on wages and hours of work, decent working conditions, health and safety, and the right to redress grievances. Consolidating up-to-date provisions of existing ILO instruments on maritime concerns, the MLC 2006 is intended to be globally applicable, easily understandable, readily updatable and uniformly enforceable. It is seen to complement the key Conventions of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) such as the SOLAS (Safety of Life at Sea), STCW (Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers) and the MARPOL (Marine Pollution). The MLC 2006 is designed to become a global legal instrument that, once entered into force, will be the “fourth pillar” of the international regulatory regime for quality shipping.

Filipinos and other seafarers would benefit from the immediate ratification and implementation of this convention. This would promote an even playing field where seafarers and their manning states no longer compete to lower standards and wages. The evils of the FOC system would also be addressed effectively as the flag state’s responsibilities are now clearly defined. The enforcement of the rights and standards under this convention will now be the responsibility of the flag state, the port state where the ship is found, the labor-supplying state that mans the seafarers, and the shipowner and its recruitment and placement agents. This would complement the existing inspectorate of the labor federation of ITF and the various church-based seafarers’ centers like the Stella Maris of the Apostleship of the Seas and the Seafarers Mission of the Protestant churches.

For the convention to be enforced, it must be ratified by at least 30 countries representing at least 33 percent of the world’s gross tonnage. To date, five countries have ratified the Maritime Labor Convention of 2006, namely Liberia, Marshall Islands, Bahamas, Panama and Norway. This has fulfilled one of the two conditions for the entry into force of the convention, since Panama is the largest flag state with nearly 25 percent of the world’s merchant fleet. Now, all that is needed is for twenty five countries to ratify the convention.

Recalling that more than 25 percent of world seafarers are Filipinos, a problem now lies with the Philippine government with its failure or deliberate refusal to ratify the convention. The government owes it to the Filipino seafarers to ratify this convention the soonest time possible, and to repeal all national laws and policies that worsen the exploitation and oppression of the Filipino seafarers. They, who have contributed so much to our national economic survival, are at least entitled to decent wages and working conditions.

Seafarers are not commodities to be offered in the world market. They are human beings with rights and dignity, equal to all other workers whose collective labor has kept the global economy flowing through the ages. The good intentions of international instruments, such as the Maritime Labor Convention of 2006, will remain illusory if seafarers themselves do not fight for and claim their rights. As governments continue to neglect their responsibility to uphold the rights and to protect the welfare of workers, seafarers’ organizations and advocates must remain vigilant. Seafarers must persist in organizing, uniting, and launching concerted actions to expose and oppose schemes of exploitation. Only they can turn the tide in their favor.

Endnotes

1Seafarers Situationer, Module I, 2009, International Seafarers, Action Center (ISAC) slide 11.
2Ibid. slide 19.
3 UNCTAD Review of Maritime Transport, 2008.
4 http://www.itfseafarers.org/illegal-practices.cfm
5 http://www.itfseafarers.org/FOC_campaign.cfm
6 http:///www.ilo.org/global/About_the_ILO/Media and_public_information/Feature_stories/lang--en/WCMS_103260/index.htm
7 Ibid. (http://www.ilo.org/global/About_the_ILO/Media_and_public_information/Feature_stories/lang--en/WCMS_103260/index.htm)

Atty. Edwin de la Cruz is President of the International Seafarers Action Center (ISAC), a non-profit action center for the protection of seafarers rights and welfare.