Does shipping have an image problem? Has it failed to attract the attention of the public at the right time to the right things? Or is this just a hopeful dream by those who think they have something to gain by promoting the image of the maritime sector to a public that always seems to have something else to focus on?
Fathom World focuses on the internal developments of the shipping maritime and oceans sectors as they evolve through economic, regulatory and social pressures, and there is a belief that this transformation should be catching the public attention more. Instead stranded giant boxships blocking canals, oil spills, air pollution, abandoned crews seem to make the main headlines, occasionally with stories of how ships are beached to be recycled.
It is true, bad news sells. That is what the mainstream media focus on. At journalism school tutors ask a simple question: “Why do people watch the news or read the papers?” There are two simple reasons. People want to know if the world is safe and if not why not, and secondly what’s gone wrong and how. This latter is the same reason people slow down to gawp at a motorway accident.
You only have to think about why you devour news to understand your motivations. Business journalism is a different beast in some ways as it is about looking for opportunities, about looking for risks as well, such as missing a trend. Instead of asking whether it is safe in the world business papers try to answer the question of where’s the opportunity for our company.
In last week’s Shipping and Sustainability call on Clubhouse we invited Guy Platten, secretary General of the International Chamber of Shipping to talk to you, and us, and answer questions about how shipping is being branded. We wanted to know what he thought we could do about it.
The following Shipping & Sustainability File is not taken verbatim from that discussion, and reflects the comments and opinions of all those on the call, not just that of the hosts (GIna Panayiotou & Craig Eason) and our guest (Guy Platten).
It will be a long road to make shipping an attractive industry for school leavers. In order to riwse in the public consciousness , Shipping community must committed to addressing the impacts of climate change as an industry and to offsetting the impact of climate change to our own actions. We need the green NGOs putting pressure on us is really important as well. The environmental organizations are very sophisticated in this effort and putting the pressure on, but we need to also respond, live up to our obligations, but make it clear that we are absolutely committed to addressing the impacts of climate change as an industry. And there’s all sorts of R&D ,our fund (the 5 billion dollars IMO initiative)is there about to accelerate we’ve got to as an industry to introduce zero carbon fuel ships at scale in the 2030s, which is less than 10 years away, which is an incredible challenge that faces us now.
At the same time ,we need to educate the public that that’s going to come at a price. That’s a price, which will be worth paying, but we it’s not a zero sum game. So it is essential to get some education to do and to explain the importance, the role that shipping plays. Part of ICS strategy is to educate and promote powerful and positive stories for the industry. So you have to preach to somebody else with interesting material that is simple to understand in sample language in which we can all read late to others in stories to share. That would really help us to also get that positive vibe out there. Communications costs money, you have to invest in it. And you have to be relentless with it, you have to keep on going with it as well. But it does produce results, if you’re prepared to make that investment and you manage that investment very carefully. It can produce really good stories to tell them once you can tell it as people really do listen to it, and it resonates with them.
The next 10 years will see fundamental changes in our industry. And that’s something we’ve got to also use as an opportunity to market it to a new audience in terms of careers. We need to show young people coming into seafarers that it just part of their journey within the industry really. We just need to make sure that people understand that they’re not signing up for 40 years that seat, they’re signing up for a fun lifetime and fulfilling lifetime and rewarding lifetime in what is a critical industry.
There is an increase of interest from the mainstream media as $14 trillion worth of goods travel by sea every year.Everyone are busy running their own companies and getting down to the work and nor lifting their heads up and realizing that there’s a wider society out there, which we need to engage. So there is changing swift where more people and private companies are coming forward and speak out as companies realize the importance of reputational management. And even if they say, some controversial remarks, sometimes it’s all right through because people like to hear exactly what people think as the media want to hear from the true practitioners.I think we do have to start changing that the mentality they be under the radar, they don’t want to make a passive noise. And that just needs personalities within the companies as well to come forward and be prepared to come up and speak out.
Bad news seems to sell. But actually, we can use that to our advantage as well, like the crew change crisis that resonated because you can use it to get messages across, to promote a positive image of our industry. Also we can use it to explain what we’re doing to try and make sure that doesn’t happen
At the same time we haven’t got a bad story to tell.We are the only global industry, which has a minimum wage, no other global industry does we’ve got in terms of looking after our workforce of our people that there’s a long way to go. And there’s always fonts to have to be seen and the bad actors out there.
Covid-19 and the lockdowns have been changed and the there’s some negatives and some positives as well. But it enabled the communication from different parts of the industry through zoom and other platforms like clubhouse. It created that opportunity to be able to collaborate more and sharing information that will help all to going forward . In fact that’s been set by numerous people outside of the industry. They have not seen so much collaboration. No industry has come together as much as we have done over the last year. And that just shows the strength of our industry. In doing that, you can’t even tell me one other industry has done that we’ve done what we’ve done over this last 12 months in terms of collaborating, working together and promoting it.
‘’If you’re involved in shipping, you’re all ambassadors for our industry and, and be proud of it’’
The Shipping & Sustainability Show on Clubhouse is a joint undertaking from
Fathom World & Oceans Arena/It’s All About Shipping
