The members of the European Tugowners Association (ETA) met in Alicante for its 60th Annual General Meeting. This year´s event was kindly hosted by ETA local member Boluda Towage and took place at the splendid Asia Gardens Hotel. 140 delegates attended a special Annual General Meeting which was marked by the 60th anniversary of the Association.
The ETA Annual General Meeting approved the change in the Chairmanship of the Association. After two productive years, Vicente Boluda Ceballos (Boluda Towage) passed the baton to Alberto Dellepiane (Rimorchiatori Riuniti Porto di Genova) who will be the ETA´s Chairman for the next two years. Mr Dellepiane will be assisted in his role by a new Deputy Chairman, Mattias Hellstrom from Svitzer Sverige.
The Executive Committee and the Annual General Meeting delegates reviewed the Secretariat´s work carried out during the last 9 months and discussed the current affairs affecting the towage sector like the new EU rules on shipping emissions and competition. The delegates welcomed as well the new associate member, LionRock Maritime. With the addition of this new member ETA reaches the number of 83 full members and 43 associate ones.
The four days event was full of activities organized not only to foster the discussions on the Association and the sector´s future, but also designed to reinforce the business and personal relations among ETA members.
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In this edition, the ETA Conference had as theme ‘People, the most valuable resource in our industry’. The speakers and attendants debated on the current aspects around the human resource in the shipping sector from the shortage in labour to the need to update the skills of crews. Thus, Ivan Wagenaar (TOS) gave a snapshot of today’s labour market realities and how these are impacting the shipping sector in a particular way. Kathy Speelman (Antwerp Maritime Academy) remarked the importance of increasing the attractiveness of maritime careers and adapt them to cadet´s new needs in order to address labour shortages. Furthermore, building on this, Alicia Montañés (Wista Spain) highlighted the opportunities the sector is missing by not employing and attracting more women nor working harder to adapt maritime careers to women´s requirements in terms of safety, health, skills or stereotypes. Aileen Van Raemdonck (EMPA) and Lamia Kerdjoudj (FEPORT) discussed how their sectors, maritime pilots and port terminals, are coping with labour shortage and the uptake of new skills. Finally, Lise Demant (Svitzer) gave an overview of her company´s best practice to attract talent and foster the acquisition of new skills.
The ETA Secretariat wants to thank the host company, Boluda Towage, for its warm and avid assistance which made this 60th Annual Meeting a great success. The Secretariat also wants to extend its deepest gratitude to the sponsors for their generous contribution.
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