The China Navigation Company Crewing Operations, Safety & Training Circular August 2017 It is my pleasure to again update you on Crewing Operations, Safety & Training matters in CNCO. Any and all feedback from you will be much appreciated, and we shall use such feedback to improve on the content, the layout and the frequency of the circular. I wish you a good read and safe sailing or alternatively a good and peaceful holiday. Best wishes, Henrik Bisbo General Manager COST Organisational changes ashore We have seen quite a few changes in the office over the last several months and so I would like to update you on those. The following staff have left the company: SPSM General Manager, Mr. Kim Yong Chua, Singapore, after seven years working for the Company. Marine Administration Manager, Ms. Joyce Lai, Hong Kong, after more than thirty years working for the Company in both Singapore and Hong Kong. Marine Personnel Superintendent, Mr. Ian Chung, Singapore after five years with the company. 1
Marine Personnel Executive, Ms. Christy Kong, Singapore after a relatively short period with the company. Assistant Payroll Manager, Ms. Angela Abuel, Singapore after six years with the company. Temporarily employed Marine Personnel Executive, Ms. Clara Teo, had her last day in office on Friday 21 July. We thank them all for their contributions to the company over the years and wish them all the best in their future endeavours. The following staff have joined the company: Assistant Marine Personnel Manager, Ms. Hazel Gitgano, handling MPP officers and acting as the company super user for COMPAS. Ms. Gitgano is reporting to Capt. Jesmark Ramos. Marine personnel Executive, Mr. Muhammad Hazwan, handling training and administration. Mr. Hazwan is reporting to Marine Personnel Manager (Bulk), Ms. Jennifer Zhu. Assistant Payroll Manager, Mr. Dennis Musni, handling the payroll department and reporting to the General Manager COST. One more staff is scheduled to join the crewing department in Singapore as a replacement for Ms. Joyce Lai by late September after which our team is back to full strength. Senior Marine Personnel Manager, Capt. Jesmark Ramos, has taken on the additional responsibility of deputizing the General Manager COST for all crewing related matters. The present organisational chart for the COST department looks like this: 2
Safety & training initiatives Continuing with the Safety Awareness Course (SAC) in an interactive format for all officers and ratings. Newly recruited senior officers, junior officers, cadets and ratings mandatorily attending SAC before joining a ship. The SAC has a strong focus on hazard identification and risk mitigation as well as on empowering everyone on board, irrespective of rank, to stop any unsafe work. A total of 96 senior officers have attended an SAC in Singapore in 2017 to date. A total of 410 junior officers and ratings have attended an SAC. The core messages of the SAC are slowly getting through to our seafarers and we have received a few reports of seafarers, often ratings, stopping unsafe work. The Induction Programme for senior officers joining the company for the first time has been very effective in terms of familiarising them with the company s procedures, core values and systems. The Clearance for Sailing initiative, which is essentially an on-board familiarisation and assessment programme for newly joined masters and chief engineers is also continuing. 32 senior officers have attended the induction programme in 2017 to date. 8 masters and 14 chief engineers have attended the CFS this year until now. 3
Analysis of near miss reports and internal audit reports is now a regular feature of our safety management and is carried out on a quarterly basis. These analyses give us a good insight into the safety trends and they assist us in identifying potential areas of concern enabling us to address them suitably. Safety campaigns are also a regular feature whereby we focus on specific areas on concern. Currently a campaign on navigational safety is being run across the fleet, which will run through September 2017. We had campaigns on General Safety and Compliance with Procedures in the first two quarters of this year. The effectiveness of campaigns will from now on be monitored by auditors and trainers, ship managers and Safety &Training managers who visit the ships during this period. A specific checklist will be formulated to assist in this task thus ensuring a thorough follow-up on the impact of the campaigns. The Practical Ship Safety Course and the course on the Bosun s roles and responsibilities have now been firmly embedded in the CNCo training calendar. These two courses are held at regular intervals in Manila. The Practical Ship Safety Course has also been rolled out with our partners, Uniteam, at their training centre in Yangon, Myanmar. So far 159 junior officers and ratings have attended the Practical Ship Safety Course this year and 18 Bosuns / prospective Bosuns have attended the Bosun s course. Practical Ship Safety Course in Manila Practical Ship Safety Course in Yangon 4
Participants engaged in a class room lecture and practical exercise during Bosun s Course A cadet training programme with a structured training plan was rolled out in April this year. Five deck and five engine cadets underwent training on Szechuen and Shansi under the able guidance of chief officer Mr. Wang Xiao Shun and second engineer Mr. Vulic Miodrag, who performed the role of Cadet Training Officers (CTO) appreciably well. Currently the second batch of structured cadet training is underway with five deck cadets on Szechuen (Chief Officer Zhong Li Fu) and five engine cadets on the Shansi (second engineer Liu Huai Yuan). Crewing Activities As of Mid-2017 CNCo employed more than 1,600 seafarers with a retention rate of 89% for officers and an overall retention rate of 91% for all seafarers. We are proud of all our seafarers and would like to thank each and every one of you for your continued support and hard work. Our strong commitment to training and development of cadets and officers has led to an enhancement of our Cadet Training Programme in 2017. We interviewed 88 prospective cadets in China for the 2017 cadet batch. These candidates went through a four stage selection process including initial screening and shortlisting, written examinations, oral interviews and medical examinations resulting in 17 candidates being finally selected. Including our Cadets from Ukraine, Papua New Guinea, Australia/New Zealand, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and the Pacific Islands our total pool of Cadets recruited for 2017 sums up to 40. We expect and look forward to our experienced seafarers imparting valuable knowledge and insights to groom these officers of the future. 5
Promotions and Achievements Crewing Circular We have in place our internal promotion programme, which gives preference for promotion for our deserving existing officers, rather than external recruitments. We are very happy to announce that the following promotions have been effected since 1 st January 2017: Master 1) Capt Noreen Mary Hennessey 2) Capt Yang Chao 3) Capt Huang Qui Xing Chief Officer 1) Wang Ming Qian 2) Dai Zhenyu 3) Li Dongfeng Chief Engineer 1) Andriy Kotsuro 2) Haryadi Arifin 3) Iurii Barbul 2 nd Engineer 1) Qiu Ming Xiao 2) Ievgen Prokhorov 3) Chang Jing 4) Yang Li Yi ETO Dmytro Starovoitov We are also very pleased to have promoted the following junior officers in our fleet since January 2017: 6
To the rank of: 2 nd Officer: 11 officers 3rd Officer: 10 officers 4 th Officers: 10 officers 3 rd Engineer: 6 engineer officers 4 th Engineer: 7 engineer officers 5 th Engineer: 5 engineer officers Crewing Circular We would like to congratulate all the newly promoted Officers for their years of hard work and loyalty, and we wish them a satisfying and rewarding career with the China Navigation Company. Dismissals and Warning Letters As much as we would like to retain our seafarers we have had to let go a number of senior officers in recent months due to their conduct not being commensurate to neither their rank and experience nor the expectations of CNCo. Below these dismissals and the related circumstances are listed: A master was dismissed after various substantiated complaints were received on behaviour and attitude and breach of the Company s Code of Conduct. A master was dismissed based on a clear lack of safety awareness and a previous record of negative and irresponsible attitude. A master was dismissed due to neglecting his duties for a period of seven days whilst the vessel was at sea and the chief officer had to take over command. A master was dismissed for breaching the company s drug and alcohol policy A chief officer was dismissed for severely neglecting his duties. Two chief engineers were dismissed due to poor performance A chief engineer was dismissed due to severe lack of safety awareness that could potentially have been disastrous. Three second engineers were dismissed due to consistently poor performance. In The China Navigation Company we would certainly rather avoid having to dismiss our officers and crew or having to refuse them further employment. However, with our constant strive for zero harm, safety and high quality performance we cannot tolerate subpar and/or 7
unsafe behaviour and performance. It should be stressed that each and every case is thoroughly investigated and unfounded accusations are looked at very seriously. Official warning letters were issued to some senior officers. Details of some of the warning letters are as follows: Two second engineers were issued warning letters for failure to follow correct procedures. Warning letters were issued to the chief officer and chief engineer on a vessel for failure to report on the absence of the master for seven days during the voyage. A chief officer was issued a warning letter for ordering wrong container foundations causing wrong supply and wasted expenditure. This was deemed a serious neglect of his duties and responsibilities. Issue of a warning letter automatically results in disqualification for the annual merit bonus for the year. It is hoped that those who have received warning letters will take these to heart, learn from it and subsequently move ahead for the benefit of themselves and of CNCo. In the unfortunate event they do not improve there is no future for them with CNCo. I wish to emphasise that no employee in CNCo will face any disciplinary action for raising a safety concern whether on board or during a course or assignment ashore. On the contrary, we encourage every single crew member on board our ships to be vigilant and to report their safety concerns to their superiors. If a crew member is not comfortable confronting their superior for whatever reason, the Confide line should be used: Telephone: +65 6603 9440 SMS: +65 8228 6244 Email: confide@swirecnco.com During the period since the last Circular (dated 10 March 2017) a number of seafarers have reported to us when they have had safety or other concerns. We have investigated every single such complaint and have taken appropriate actions to address the situation. We commend those seafarers who have taken steps to make us aware of the safety concerns that we may otherwise have not known. We have, however, noticed that seafarers tend to reach out in confidence to individuals in the office rather than using the designated communication channels for such matters. 8
We urge everyone on board to use the above mentioned channels for reporting any concerns regarding safety or Code of Conduct. Please be assured that all communication received via the above channels are monitored by the same persons that some of you have reached out to individually. The advantage of using the designated channels is that nothing gets missed if an individual is traveling or is on leave as the information gets disseminated to relevant persons in the office. Safety is CNCO s overriding concern and crew and officers taking a pro-active approach to ensure we reach and maintain our goal of zero harm play the most important part in this process. New Initiatives Senior Officers Attachment Programme (SOAP) The Senior Officers Office Attachment Programme (SOAP) has been initiated with the objective of familiarising masters and chief engineers on promotion before being deployed in these roles. This programme applies to chief officers and second engineers serving in the CNCo fleet who have been selected for promotion. The officers selected for promotion are attached to various departments in the Singapore office for 10 working days, during which period the officers gain a proper introduction to and familiarisation of the functioning of 9
various departments in the office. Further they get to know several key staff in the office personally. This should help them immensely in fulfilling the requirements and high expectations of the senior most shipboard roles. In the first round two masters on promotion attended the two week programme in June. The second round is presently underway with two chief engineers on promotion. Pictured above in the Singapore office are the two pioneer officers, Captain Yang Chao and Captain Huang Qiu Xing, both from the multipurpose fleet. 10