Shipping is an alphabet soup, a jumble of acronyms and abbreviations. And there are the buzzwords and catchphrases that maritime professionals like to gobble up like salad to complement the soup. Each term has a specific meaning. Alas, the standard definition isn’t always adequate and sometimes doesn’t jibe with reality. In light of this, we’ve decided to build our own maritime glossary starting with the following 10 entries:
MLC 2006 – ILO Maritime Labour Convention, 2006, is a balm to soothe the conscience of a shipping industry that has mistreated seafarers for ages
STCW – The international protocol that governs the seafaring profession but whose full text seafarers have no access to unless they they buy a copy. Copyrighted to IMO unlike ILO conventions, which are free to download from the ILO website and free to distribute
Human Element – A buzzword that had to be invented because the traditional term ‘seafarers’ or ‘seamen’ is too old-fashioned and too complex for purposes of commercial training. Not to be confused with Dmitri Mendeleev’s ‘Periodic Table of Elements’
Quality Assurance – A piece of paper which shipping and manning companies love to frame and display in their reception areas to impress visitors
Maritime Distance Learning – Canned maritime education available at online supermarkets
Management-Level – A fancy term suggesting that a ship captain is the manager of the vessel when in fact it’s the head office that calls the shots
Simulator – A sophisticated training tool that sometimes only functions as a simple cash box for training centres
Certificate of Competency (COC) – Certificate to show that a ship officer has passed the state licensure examination or has paid his way to pass it. Referred to as ‘Certificate of Collection’ in Manila by those who are familiar with the system
Maritime NGOs – Do-gooders who love to spend other people’s money in the name of the marine environment, seafarers’ rights etc
Flags of Convenience (FOC) – Possibly the most hated term in shipping. FOC registers are maligned at every turn by the shipping industry but patronised by the same industry as they provide a cloak of anonymity to shipowners and limit their liability
Let us know if you have alternative definitions for other maritime terms. Together, we probably could come up with an entire book and sell it just like the STCW Convention and Code. ~Barista Uno
Please feel free to comment on this article.
Read Part II of our Alternative Maritime Glossary here.
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I am a content writer and can contribute. I work from India, Was in shipping for 10 years and a maritime teacher for 10 years.
Do you pay for contributions that are selected per achronym, buzzword? I liked the one about COC.
Thanks for offering to contribute to our alternative maritime glossary. Unfortunately, we don’t pay for editorial contributions to the blog, even for guest articles.
But feel free to send in your buzzwords or acronyms with your own definitions. We hope to come up with a Part II to our glossary post and will include entries from readers with the proper acknowledgment and URL link (if any).
What we said about publishing a book was just a joke. We don’t think we can make money out of it the same way IMO makes money out of the STCW Convention. 🙂
Maritime terminology has indeed changed with many time respected terms becoming as redundant as the practice that begat them.
Throwing out the baby with the bath water seems to be an appropriate description to this practice and the falling standards within the industry.