If Union Shipping Minister G K Vasan’s efforts are fructified, India will soon have the regional chapter of internationally-acclaimed World Maritime University (WMU).Addressing the students and faculty during the 4th University Day celebrations of the Indian Maritime University (IMU) here, the Minister said: “I would like to state that when the Secretary General of the International Maritime Organisation called on me last month in New Delhi, we took up with him the need for closer co-operation between Indian Maritime University (IMU) and WMU at Malmo, Sweden and International Maritime Legal Institute, Malta. We also discussed the possibility of establishing a regional branch of the WMU here in India. We would be following up all these initiatives to bring world class maritime education in our country.”
Elaborating about how maritime is most vital for economic growth of a nation among the students, Mr. Vasan stated: “The World Bank has estimated that the global maritime trade will increase to nearly 40, 000 billion ton miles in 2015 compared to 29, 000 billion ton miles recorded in 2005. The trade has slowly moved eastwards and is now Asia-centric. It has grown tremendously over the years with economic boom in China, India and other developing economies in Asia.”
He added: “The maritime sector is undergoing rapid vertical and horizontal integration in many activities. The evidence for this lies in the growing number of mergers and alliances among the ports, shipping lines and logistics service providers. “
“Attaining economies of scale has assumed primacy as could be seen from the ever increasing size of the ships and consequent development of mega hub ports to serve those ships. The world’s cargo carrying fleet in 2011 was 55,138 ships of 991 million GT and 1,483 million DWT and the average age is 19 years,” he pointed out.
Laying emphasis on sustained investments to increase capacity and performance, Mr. Vasan observed: “To remain competitive with nations in other economic regions, our country needs to adopt best practices and systems, which can be accomplished only with education and trained manpower.”
“All of you know that our Indian IT industry underwent a major revolution in the supply of man power for global needs. Similar opportunities and possibilities exist now for India in the maritime sector. Every Indian citizen can aspire to take up the maritime profession and can harness untapped potential. This trend would not only enhance the social and economic status in the maritime states, but also greatly contributes to the country’s economy”, Mr Vasan noted.
Praising the professional excellence of Indian marine engineers in international level, he remarked: “The professional excellence shown at all levels and in all spheres by our engineering cadets over the past six decades has put a tremendous demand on the nation to increase the number of marine engineers.”
Our maritime professionals have developed great capabilities for handling technologically advanced or technologically-difficult ships, the Minister said and added that it has led to a very high demand for Indian marine engineers though we train and educate more than 3,000 marine engineers every year.
Praising the IMU for taking the lead in providing maritime education in the country, he said: “IMU has introduced a number of new educational courses which were not in existence earlier. If India is to emerge as a strong nation in the world order, the University (IMU) has to play a key role in developing the human capital.”
“The research and development in the maritime sector, which is at its nascent stage, will be developed by the university in various disciplines with the aim of marching ahead in this important sector,” Mr. Vasan concluded.
He also congratulated the first Vice-Chancellor of the university and present Director of IMU Chennai Campus Dr. P. Vijayan for being instrumental in bringing up the institute to greater level in just four years time.
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