Monday, October 01, 2007 Japanese shipping firm to hire 7T Pinoy seafarers
ABOUT 7,000 Filipino seafarers are expected to be employed by Japanese shipping firm K-Line Ship Management Co. Ltd. in the next four years.
Shuichiro Maeda, president of K-Line, said the company is embarking on an expansion program and will be building 300 new ships starting next year until 2011.
“This is part of the fleet expansion,” Maeda said.
At present, Maeda said K-Line has 420 ships operating in various ports worldwide.
“We are now expanding and because of the expansion we will require 7,000 seafarers,” added Satoru Kobushima, K-Line executive vice president.
Of the total 7,000 seafarers, 3,330 would be officers and 3,600 would be ratings, he added.
He said 10 container ships will be built by the company and would be manned only by Filipino crews and officers.
“We don’t want any other nationalities there. We want it to be purely Filipino officers and crews,” he said.
Kubushima further explained that they prefer Filipinos because they have been working with them for the longest time and having a pure Filipino crew onboard a vessel is much easier to manage.
“Because communications would not be a problem,” he added.
K-Line is also building a training school in the Philippines to train and upgrade the managerial skills of their deck officers and seafarers.
The K-Line Maritime Academy-Philippines will be operational in February 2008 and is expected to train at least 10,000 seafarers annually. (MSN/Sunnex)
