• NYK Group
• Sitemap
• Japanese

• 2012
• 2011
• 2010
• 2009
• Before 2008

Safety Promotion Conference for NYK Group Ships Held

August 2, 2007

Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha (NYK; head office: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; president: Koji Miyahara) held a safety promotion conference in July at the NYK head office in Tokyo and at the Imabari Kokusai Hotel, located in the city of Imabari in Ehime prefecture. Those attending came from shipowners and ship-management companies throughout Japan, as well as ship-management companies from overseas.

Drawing on lessons learned from the Diamond Grace oil spill, which occurred in July 1997, the NYK Group conducts a month-long campaign each July to encourage all NYK employees to bear in mind the importance of safe operations. Last month?s safety promotion conference was part of this campaign and combined two previously separate conferences: one for ship-management companies of NYK-owned ships, and a NAV9000^* safety strategist conference for shipowners and management companies of NYK seagoing vessels.

A total of 131 participants from 61 companies attended. The sessions at the Imabari Kokusai Hotel took place on July 5. Those at the NYK head office were held on July 9. And separately, 21 participants from 10 overseas ship-management companies attended conference sessions at the NYK head office on July 10.

Results of last year?s NYK safety management activity, NAV9000, and details of maritime accidents were discussed. Since the annual month-long campaign began in 1998, overtime operations per vessel have been reduced by 13 percent for all seagoing vessels. Because the number of accidents involving fishing boats near port has recently increased, maintaining safe operations was stressed this year. Mutual communication between shipowners and ship-management companies was urged through effective Bridge Team Management (BTM).^**

A safety seminar was held before the conference. Lecturers Yasuhiko Nakamura from the Japan Shipowners? Mutual Protection & Indemnity Association and Yoshihiro Fujii of Japan Marine Science Inc. (head office: Kawasaki; president and CEO: Yoshitaka Fukuo) gave speeches on ?Country Risk Regarding Shipping to China? and ?Practical Operation of BTM (Bridge Team Management),? respectively.

The NYK Group intends to continue these annual conferences and seminars in order to ensure the safety of all NYK ships. The company actively strives to keep shipping operations safe for the entire NYK fleet, NYK Group affiliates, ship-management companies, shipowners, and marine- and land-related parties.

These are part of NYK safety promotions. For NYK?s own ships, as well as chartered ships, NYK requests that the owners of the ships, or the ship-management companies, comply with NYK?s original standards for safe operation and environmental protection. NYK also conducts regular auditing of the implementation of safe practices to advise on necessary improvements. Since these efforts began in 1998, NYK has conducted a total of 2,488 audits of seagoing vessels, involving 190 companies. As a result, some 18,000 improvements have been made. When a nonconformity is discovered through an audit, NYK discusses it in periodic safety meetings with the relevant parties and passes along the audit information to all seagoing vessels by means of the NYK safety information publication Calm Sea, which contributes to preventing the reoccurrence of a similar nonconformity.

Under this practice, crew members assemble on the ship?s bridge as one team in an effort to prevent errors that may occur as a result of one team member?s misjudgment. Team members check unsafe actions with each other and make reports. This management practice helps prevent the occurrence of accidents.