International Maritime Organization

International Maritime Organization
International Maritime Organization;
	IMO Member Countries Permanent Members Associate Members Candidates
Membership	174 members
Headquarters	London , UK
Type of organization	UN Specialized Agency
Base
Base	March 6, 1948
imo.org

This article is about an international maritime organization. About the musical direction of imo see article emo .

The International Maritime Organization, or IMO ( International Maritime Organization, IMO ) - an international intergovernmental organization, is a specialized agency of the United Nations , serves as an apparatus for cooperation and exchange of information on technical issues related to international trade shipping.

IMO headquarters in London , view from the Voxhall Bridge

IMO headquarters in London, view from the Thames

Content

1 History
2 IMO Objectives
3 IMO structure
4 Main functions of IMO
5 IMO Activities
6 See also
7 Literature
8 References

History

IMO was established on March 6, 1948 in Geneva with the adoption of the Convention on the Intergovernmental Maritime Consultative Organization (IMCO) ( English Inter-Governmental Maritime Consultative Organization, IMCO ). The Convention entered into force on March 17, 1958 , and the newly created organization began its practical activities. At the 9th session of the Assembly of this organization (Resolution A.358 (IX)), its name was changed and its current name has been in force since May 22, 1982 . The headquarters is located in London .

IMO Tasks

IMO's activities are aimed at eliminating discriminatory acts affecting international trade shipping, as well as adopting norms ( standards ) on ensuring maritime safety and preventing pollution from ships of the environment , especially the marine environment. It has a staff of about 300 people.

In a sense, IMO is a forum in which the member states of this organization exchange information, discuss legal, technical and other issues related to shipping, as well as pollution from environmental vessels, especially the marine environment.

IMO Structure

As of March 5, 2018, the IMO has 173 member states and 3 associate members ( Faroe Islands , Hong Kong , Macau ). The supreme body of the organization is the Assembly of Member States. Sessions of the Assembly meet once every 2 years. There is also an IMO Council, consisting of 40 states, including Russia . The states are divided into three large groups: 10 leading maritime states, 10 other states significant in terms of international maritime trade, and 20 maritime states elected to the Council in order to ensure geographical representation of various regions of the world.

In addition to the Assembly, there are 5 committees within the framework of IMO:

Maritime Safety Committee (MSC - MSC);
Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC - MEPC );
Legal Committee (LEG - YURKOM );
Technical Cooperation Committee (CCC);
Shipping Facilitation Committee (FAL),

as well as 9 subcommittees (as part of the MSC or MEPC) and a secretariat led by the Secretary-General. Since 2012, the representative of Japan, Koji Sekimizu, has been elected Secretary-General.

All regulatory and legal documents prepared in subcommittees and considered at sessions of committees are considered and adopted, as a rule, at regular sessions of the Assembly of the Organization. The most serious strategic decisions can be made by the decisions of the Diplomatic Conferences organized by the IMO.

IMO takes decisions in the form of Resolutions of the Organization, to which, if necessary, various documents can be attached (codes, circular letters, amendments to existing documents - conventions, codes, etc.). Subject to the stipulated conditions and the terms of entry into force, such binding decisions should be implemented by the Administrations (Governments of member countries). Decisions of the IMO Assembly that do not modify or supplement the adopted conventions are advisory in nature and can be implemented by national maritime administrations by incorporating decisions (or creating their own decisions on their basis) in national legislation.

IMO Core Functions

acts as a specialized agency of the United Nations ( UN );
is an advisory and advisory organization;
responsible for organizing maritime safety and environmental protection, as well as resolving legal issues related to international shipping;
contributes to facilitating the interaction of governments of states on technical issues to achieve the highest standards in the field of maritime safety and pollution prevention;
Adopts and improves binding and recommendatory international conventions, codes, resolutions, protocols, circulars and recommendations.

IMO Activities

IMO's first task was to adopt a new version of the most important of all conventions dealing with maritime safety - the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea, SOLAS . The first version of this document was adopted back in 1914, following the wreck of the Titanic , the second in 1929 after the death of Westris, the third in 1948 , partly after the Grankan explosion , that is, were caused by specific shipwrecks . The fourth edition, which began IMO, was the first significant task after its creation and, in fact, was the first whose development and adoption were carried out on a systematic basis. The fourth edition of the Convention, adopted on June 17, 1960 by IMO, represented a significant step forward in modernizing instructions and maintaining the pace of technological development in the shipping industry and was put into effect on May 26, 1965 .

After that, IMO turned its attention to issues such as:

facilitating international shipping, which resulted in the 1965 Convention on the facilitation of international shipping ,
determination of the position of the freight mark, as a result of which the Convention on the 1966 freight mark and the transport of dangerous goods appeared
The tonnage measurement system was also revised, resulting in the 1969 International Convention on the Measurement of Ships .

In the future, IMO continued to improve the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea. On November 1, 1974, at the International Conference on the Safety of Life at Sea, a new text of the SOLAS Convention was adopted. In 1988, the Protocol to this Convention was adopted at the International Conference on a Harmonized System of Inspection and Registration of Certificates. In 1992, the so-called Consolidated Text of the SOLAS Convention was published at IMO.

Although safety at sea was and remains the most important task of IMO, in the mid-60s of the XX century a new problem began to come to the fore - environmental pollution, primarily marine pollution. The increase in the number of oil products transported by sea, as well as the size of the ships transporting these oil products caused particular concern. The magnitude of the problem was demonstrated by the accident of the Torrey Canyon tanker in 1967 , when 120,000 tons of oil fell into the sea.

Over the next few years, IMO has taken a number of measures aimed at preventing tanker accidents, as well as minimizing the consequences of these accidents. The organization also dealt with environmental pollution caused by activities such as cleaning oil tanks, as well as dumping machine room waste - in terms of tonnage they do more harm than pollution due to accidents.

The most important of these measures was the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, MARPOL, adopted in 1973 and amended by the 1978 Protocol. It covers not only cases of accidental and / or operational pollution of the environment with oil products, but also pollution of the sea with liquid chemicals, harmful substances in packaged forms, bilge water , garbage and pollution from airborne vessels. In 1990, the International Convention on Preparedness, Control and Cooperation for Oil Pollution was also prepared and signed.

In addition, IMO solved the problem of creating a system aimed at providing compensation to those who suffered financially as a result of pollution. The relevant two multilateral agreements (the International Convention on Civil Liability for Oil Pollution Damage and the International Convention on the Establishment of an International Fund for the Compensation of Oil Pollution Damage ) were adopted in 1969 and 1971 , respectively. They simplified and accelerated the process of obtaining compensation for pollution. Both Conventions were revised in 1992 and again in 2000 , which allowed to increase the limits of compensation payable to victims of pollution.

Under the auspices of IMO, a large number of other international agreements and documents on issues affecting international shipping have also been prepared and are being prepared.

The tremendous advances made in communications technology have made it possible to make major improvements to the marine distress rescue system. In the 1970s, a global disaster search and rescue system was put in place. At that time, the International Maritime Satellite Organization (INMARSAT - INMARSAT ) was created, which seriously improved the conditions for the transmission of radio and other communications from and to ships at sea.

In 1978, IMO launched World Maritime Day with the aim of drawing attention to the issue of maritime safety and the conservation of marine bioresources.

In 1992, the stages of the implementation of the Global Maritime Distress and Safety Communication System ( GMDSS , Global Maritime Distress and Safety System, GMDSS ) were determined. Since February 1999, the GMDSS has been fully commissioned and now a ship in distress anywhere in the world can receive help, even if the ship’s crew does not have time to broadcast a help signal by radio, as the corresponding message will be transmitted automatically.

Other measures developed by IMO concerned the safety of containers, bulk cargo, tankers designed to transport liquefied gas, as well as other types of ships.

Special attention was paid to crew training standards, including the adoption of the special International Convention for the Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping (STCW ) adopted in 1978 and entered into force on 28 April 1984 In 1995, the STCW Convention was significantly revised. Significant changes to the content of the STCW Convention were made later, including in 2010 at a conference in Manila ( Philippines ). It is currently recommended that the convention be called “STCW as amended” ( STCW as amended ).

In 1983, the IMO in Malmo (Sweden) founded the World Maritime University, which provides advanced training for managers, teachers and other specialists in the field of shipping. In 1989, the IMO International Institute of the Law of the Sea was established in Valletta ( Malta ), which trains lawyers in the field of international law of the sea. Then in Trieste (Italy) was founded the International Maritime Academy, which conducts specialized short-term courses in various marine disciplines.

Literature

International Maritime Law: Textbook / Ed. S. A. Gureeva. - M .: "Legal literature", 2003.
Myron H. Nordquist, John Norton Moore. International Maritime Organization. - University of Virginia. Center for Oceans Law and Policy. 1999
Kenneth R. Simmonds. The International Maritime Organization. - Simmonds & Hill Pub., 1994
Constantinos Kyprou Hadjistassou. International maritime organization: rethinking marine environmental policy. - Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Ocean Engineering. 2005 (English)