COLUMN | European maritime and ports strategy consultations: what does it mean for tug companies? [Tug Times]

My attention was recently drawn to a press release from the European Tugowners Association (ETA) that sets out their hopes for support from the European Union as it finalises its European Maritime Industrial Strategy and European Port Strategy.

Apparently, these new strategy documents are expected to be published by the end of the year and, "will establish a new policy framework for the European shipping sector."

Obviously, I am not the best person to comment on affairs in the EU because I live in a place where you get very little help from anyone and are expected to survive on your own merits, so my apologies if I misunderstand the bureaucratic niceties or the language of EU-related documents.

I think I understood parts of the ETA press release, but confess there were sections that, although written in English, might just as well have been in ancient Greek for all the sense they made to me.

The ETA begins by welcoming the initiative and pointing out that shipbuilding and equipment manufacturing are a cornerstone of technological innovation and sustainability and a key enabler of strategic autonomy for the continent.

So far, so good, and couched in language that will be music to the ears of the bureaucrats in Brussels. Note the clever use of such appealing concepts as "autonomy for the continent" and "sustainability".

They go on to advocate a strategy that ensures that Europe remains the leader in manufacturing state-of-the-art vessels, and point out that for many years tugs, have been manufactured in Europe.

But they caution that this is now in decline due to more favourable prices in Asia, even though the latest innovations still happen in Europe. I thought this was overstating the case because there are so many successful tug builders in Turkey, for example, and even in the Far East there are yards owned by companies where the profits, presumably, find their way back to Europe.

It took a while for the penny to drop! When they say Europe, they actually mean "within the EU," so those excellent Turkish yards do not count and are lumped together with the Orientals and other ne’er-do- wells. I imagine the ETA people are delighted the strategy will be implemented quite soon, before Turkey can become an EU member and undermine their argument.

They go on to recommend targeted and comprehensive support for shipbuilding and equipment manufacturing, including, "simplified pathways to both public and private funding," and a regulatory environment that supports innovation and manufacturing, with frameworks that encourage calculated risk-taking and smart maritime technologies, among other things.

They also propose the development of, "a coherent set of incentives designed to attract shipowners to place orders within Europe."

On security and safety grounds, they quite sensibly say that tugs should be recognised as strategic maritime assets, since they are indispensable for moving ships around ports, and are frontline emergency responders.

Also, as strategic assets, tugs would qualify under a number of EU initiatives for support of one kind or another. They add that it is crucial to establish a strategic inventory of spare parts within Europe to keep the tugs running.

Finally, the ETA recommend attracting young Europeans to the shipping, shipbuilding and equipment manufacturing sectors, and supporting those already in those sectors by developing both traditional and technological skills and upskilling to keep pace with digital and "green" innovation.

Turning to the European Port Strategy, the ETA make a number of suggestions about balancing competitiveness, environmental considerations and social responsibility and recognising towage as being indispensable to port safety. They urge the establishment of a level playing field, both within the EU and in alignment with IMO regulations.

They state that, "EU funding could play a tranformative role by supporting pilot projects, retrofitting existing fleets, and investing in the digitalisation and automation of towage operations."

The document ends with a rousing call for money. They ask the EU to, "empower member states to provide strategic, proportionate, and legally sound support for essential port investments.....that private operators and port services providers cannot shoulder alone while staying globally competitive."

The State Aid Framework for Ports should explicitly include harbour towage.

It must be hard to run tugs in the EU, so asking for money (which is how I read this press release) is probably inevitable. And if there is money to be had, then I would prefer to see it going to tug owners and not more dubious recipients. The ETA will probably not get everything it is asking for, but whatever it does get might be transformative for the industry.

My problem is that I am uncomfortable with some of the wording. The ominous warning about tug building increasingly moving to Asia sounds like a dig at China, and is sure to resonate with EU lawmakers, even if it is rather misleading.

Tugs, as mentioned above, are increasingly being built in the excellent Turkish yards, and recently also in India. Vietnam and Indonesia have healthy tug building sectors, and although the majority of Chinese yards build for domestic owners, yards will build for anybody and, so far as I know, are doing it without state funding or interference.

Of course, the recent blatant political interference in Hutchison’s decision to sell off their container terminals might raise a large question mark over the wisdom of building tugs in China, but there are plenty of other options in Asia where politics is unlikely to become a factor. In short, I think the ETA are overstating the risks.

Apart from that, I enjoyed the juxtaposition of training good people and investing in digitalisation and automation. It sounds like a call to train more people so we can quickly get rid of them and replace them with technology. This would be unwise, in my opinion.

Tug crews are tiny and not particularly well paid, and at least they can do a certain amount of planned maintenance if they are physically present on the tugs. And with all the things that can go wrong during harbour towage, I would rather have a grizzled veteran at the controls than any number of highly-trained youngsters in a command centre ashore.

The one glaringly obvious fact missing from the ETA submission is that, despite all the present hardships, European tug owners appear to be doing quite well. According to the latest research I could find, the largest tug fleets on Earth belong to Boluda, Svitzer and MSC. All three are based in Europe and operate globally, and can build new tugs just about anywhere.

If the ETA get even some of the things on their wish list it will, presumably, make the largest companies even more powerful, which might not be good news for smaller tug owners, wherever they operate.