Editorial

Perhaps the best thing I ever heard during the 1st International Seafarers Family Convention is to have more women as seafarers not only on cruise ships or luxury liners but on trade ships.

While admittedly the seafaring industry is a male-dominated profession, there is always a place for us women in this career and it is only fitting for the top supplier of manpower for the global ships to have a program for Pinay cadettes.

It will still take a very long journey before women power can compete with the number of male seafarers onboard international-going vessels but we could start this early in order for Filipinas not to dubbed as ‘domestic helpers’ but the best ‘pinay seafarers’ worldwide.

If we were able to succeed in increasing the number of Filipina seafarers onboard trade vessels we will not be dubbed as the ‘manning capital of the world’ but the ‘best men and women seafarers of the world’.

Hopefully, in the lifetime of this paper, it will be able to accommodate a story boasting of the achievement of Pinay seafarers.

Go, girl power!!!

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The STCW Convention

The implementation of the amended STCW Convention is only four months away and what have we accomplished thus far?

Admittedly, as of this time, there is no activity at both Houses of Congress and even at the Office of the president prioritizing the legal backbone of the implementation of the amended Code instead, our honorable Senators and Congressmen are busy investigating an issue that can only yield about a couple of millions of pesos instead of focusing on crafting a law that ensures the existence one of the backbone of the Philippines.

By January 1, the International Maritime Organization is set to impose the amended provisions of the law and as we said before, the Philippines could not afford to miss the deadline as it will render a big blow not only to the industry but most especially to the country as a whole.

Hopefully, our lawmakers and maritime stakeholders alike can find time in making sure that the country will be able to comply.

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A salute to a great mariner…

Harborscope would like to condole with the family of CAPT. JESSE B. MARTINEZ who joined his creator on August 17 after years of battling several illnesses.

Capt. Martinez is a great loss to the maritime industry and he will surely be missed.

To our Captain, may you rest in peace!

Zeny Magnial

Managing Editor

Roundatable Discussion

The Bridging Program: the Philippine Experience (part 2)

She stated that the Bridging Program is really an innovative and industry-driven because it is done in consultation with government agencies like DOLE, CHED, and PRC which have respective roles to play in the success of this program. She also cited that the assistance of the shipping companies cannot be overemphasized because of their support being the ones who are absorbing the cadets as well as the ones supporting the program as have mentioned by Dr. Salabas. Moreover, Ms. Fernandez stressed that the existing Bridging Program really addresses the shortage. She revealed that the program is not permanent, so as soon as the shortage is addressed the program will die automatically. She also disclosed that they have another program at CHED wherein they are having consultation with Board of Electronics and Communications Engineering of PRC because of oversupply in the field which can be tapped to be Electro Technical Officer . Further, she commended VMA for having the highest enrolment among the 16 maritime institutions. In spite of the success of the program, Ms. Fernandez articulated that the challenge is still there because figures showed that there are still some graduates who remain as support or ratings when the target of this program is for officership. Hence, she suggested that these cadets be assisted in taking and passing the board examination.

Dr. Elizabeth Salabas, meanwhile, expressed her appreciation for the reactions and feedback received from the listeners. She clarified that there are still Bridging Program graduates who are serving as ratings because they still have to prove that they deserve to become officers; though their development is slow.

The problem, she stated, is that companies, through their training managers, should monitor their Bridging Program cadets’ performance and encourage the senior officers onboard to mentor them. As regards the support from OWWA, she advised schools with sponsoring companies, to give them notice as to the status (enrollment to completion) of the program in their respective areas. The status must be presented to PJMCC for them to endorse it to OWWA since PJMCC and OWWA are the ones with memorandum of agreement.

On the other hand, Dr. Salabas suggest that the non-paying or self-paying student should not only be involved in the academics but also in the value-added programs since it is where discipline must be established and developed.

Further, Dr. Salabas thanked MAAP for its support and mentioned that she is hoping to have complete data from all the schools for their collaborative research. She hoped that with Mrs. Fernandez from CHED, the focus on Bridging Program will be given much attention. Also, Dr. Salabas acknowledge Capt. Makoto Kuno as the father of Bridging Program at VMA because of his support especially for his initiative in recruiting nationwide providing them with an excess of 29 candidates ready for BP batch number 10 in their institution. She also acknowledged the brains of the program C/E Maambong, Capt. George Pimentel, Capt. Arcellana, and CHED.

Mr. Crisanto (Far East Maritime Foundation) mentioned about a very intensive 10-week course for BSMarE graduates for them to be competent and have received good feedback from companies compared to others. He suggested concentrating in the enhancement of cadets rather than recruiting mechanical engineers to become maritime cadets. Dr. Salabas responded that Bridging Program was developed to address the shortage of engine officers on board. She added that with the regular cadets, it would take more than five years to produce.

She assured that the regular program is continued. C/E Marasigan also reacted about the pronouncement of Mr. Crisanto and provided some statistics from CHED. He revealed that in SY 2004-2005, there are 5, 957 BSMT graduates while there are 1, 000 BSMarE graduates; the same throughout the years until 2009. Hence, he reflected that the number of BSMarE graduates is only 20% of the total maritime graduate population. Knowing that there is one C/E and one Captain on board the ship, C/E Marasigan asserted that with this kind of data, there will be large shortage of marine engineers in the near future which should be tapped from somewhere else. So, he cited that Bridging Program is the best source for this shortage. Also in support to the Bridging Program, C/E Maambong stressed that this program was created to address the shortage. He relayed that being involved with the maritime institution in CHED in terms of inspection of schools; he noticed the imbalance of enrolment. He even jokingly stated that marine engineers are endangered species. He then, pointed out that they have to look somewhere else, particularly with the surplus in mechanical engineering with the training, though they have to undergo the process documented under the Training RecordsBook (TRB). He concluded that once the shortage is stabilized and maritime schools are accepting students in balanced numbers [deck and engine cadets of the same numbers], then sooner the shortage is addressed and the program will end.

Ms. Fernandez, meanwhile, assured that, even with the innovative Bridging Program, with the assistance of Technical Panel, well-known seafarers and officers and technical persons in the maritime, CHED will continue in their efforts to promote BSMT and BSMarE programs. In fact, she added that Maritime Program in CHED has always been a priority program in scholarship, except that students do not avail of this scholarship.

Capt. Martinez agreed with Mr. Crisanto that it is really quite a challenge to all to focus and really develop the students in the BS Marine Engineering. He stated that it is a challenge to convince students that the glory of being a captain or chief engineer is the same as it is observed that more prospective candidates in the maritime course wanted to be captains than chief engineers.

C/E Ferdinand Marcos, (President of EXACT Training Center), said that the presentation revealed that the Bridging Program has only almost 200 graduates in five years while there are actually lots of graduates in marine engineering. However, he noted that some companies have standards in recruiting them with series of examination and interview on technical know-how and competency assessments. He announced that EXACT has a program to help deck and engine cadets to be more competent. He informed that they are training students before they take entrance tests in manning agencies. He also mentioned that 80% of the program teaches the cadets on technical know-how such as in diesel engines, overhauling, lathe machine, instrumentation and hands-on, so the students passed the written exams and interviews by crewing marine engineers. He added that they are more competent and even as engine cadets acted as junior officers. C/E Marcos, then, urged those who do not have manning agencies for their shipboard training to come to EXACT to be trained for their future career.

Mr. Leo Santiago (Owner and Editor-In-Chief of the Shipping and Travel Journal) stated that after the project, there is an assessment, like this discussion, to determine the pros and cons and the advantages and disadvantages. He added that since this is temporary, the Bridging Program should be assessed thoroughly by every sector to gather feedback for improvement if needed. He also expressed that if the clients will continue to increase their Bridging Program sponsorship to address the marine engineer shortage then the program will be very successful. So his recommendation is a good and thorough assessment of the project which should be written and published [which he signified helping along this line] for everybody to know what is really happening in the program and then it can be considered that the industry really supports the Bridging Program.

As a recap of the round table discussion , it can be surmised that the Bridging program is successful in having augmented the supply of marine engineers in the Philippines. Many schools ( 16 out of the 93 accredited maritime schools in the Philippines ) are vehicles of the government to implement and improve the Bridging Program notably MAAP which has piloted the program and VMA Global College having the most number of enrollees. Clearly, the bridging program is only a sort of a tentative measure applied to address the problem of shortage of marine engineers. Once the shortage of supply is addressed, the programs will eventually terminate. ?