The Asia Pacific Port State Control under the Tokyo Memorandum of Understanding has decided to increase the regional inspections percentage from 50 per cent to 75 per cent beginning 1 October, 2000.
This followed the meeting of the Port State Control Committee, the executive body under the Port State Control in the Asia Pacific region in Singapore in February this year. The meeting was chaired by Trevor Rose, manager, ship inspections
programme, Australian Maritime Safety Authority.
This meeting, which adopted a new annex of qualitative criteria for members, agreed to revise the Port State Control Manual in order to incorporate the amendments to resolution A.787(19) adopted by the International Maritime Organisation recently. The PSC Committee considered a further analysis of the results on the concentrated inspection campaign
(CIC) on International Ship Management Code compliance which ran from July to September 1998. The Committee decided that to facilitate full implementation of the ISM Code, a second CIC on the ISM Code will take place from July to September 2002 (concurrently to the one planned by the Paris
MOU).
The Committee also decided to establish a MOU Standing Working Group to facilitate the work of the Committee in order to ensure more effective operation of the MOU and resolving important work and issues raised at
inter-sessional meetings. The meeting in Singapore was attended by 18 maritime administrations in the region, including Malaysia which was represented by a delegation headed by Abdul Jamil
Murshid, Director of Maritime Industry Control Division Marine Department, Peninsular Malaysia.
(Footnote: Port State Control is the authority by which a nation exercises powers over foreign ships when the vessel is in the waters under the jurisdiction of the nation. The purpose of Port State Control in its various forms is to identify ships which do not comply with internationally-accepted standards as well as domestic regulations of the state concerned. The Tokyo MOU was concluded in 1993 by 18 maritime administrations and came into effect in April 1994.)
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