Between us

On seamanship and education

“With a declared common desire for the revival of seafaring – an integral part of the Greek maritime miracle – in our country, a coordinated effort between the state and the shipping sector to inform and attract young people to the maritime profession began a few months ago. The great Greek shipping sector is sending out an open invitation to ‘a sea of opportunities’, with open horizons for professional and personal development, at a time of special challenges in the recovery of employment. Attracting young people to the maritime profession, combined with a necessary further increase in the capacity of the merchant marine academies, as well as the expected modernization of maritime education, will contribute decisively to maintaining maritime expertise in our country and increasing the presence of Greek sailors in Greek-owned shipping, goals which, in any case, require diligence and dedication for their achievement”.

Beautifully put by Theodoros Veniamis, president of the Union of Greek Shipowners, these sentiments were also taken up by the minister of shipping, who told us that the government is paying particular attention to maritime education. As confirmation of his words, the minister announced the securing of funds amounting to 200 million euro from the NSRF 2021-2027 for the support and overall reform of public maritime education.

“Projects worth 12 million euro, to modernize the equipment and laboratories of the merchant marine academies, have already been approved by NSRF 2014-2020 and are underway, as is a study programme on energy efficiency upgrades for all the academies, worth 4.5 million euro. The number of places in the academies has also been increased from 1,153 for the 2020-2021 academic year nationwide, to 1,641 for the 2021-2022 academic year”.

What we are not being told, however, is that the candidates for the merchant marine academy entrance exams are becoming fewer and fewer. Neither did we hear anything about the increase in Greek student numbers at the academies of Cyprus, Romania or Bulgaria.

We see that the government is persisting with the model of the state monopoly for the academies, leaving just some loopholes for non-state education with the Technical Maritime Schools, which appear to be winning the game, albeit with slow steps.

Has the government done a survey to let us know how many of the students from the Greek state academies go into maritime professions when they get their degree? Is it true that more than 30 percent of academy graduates do not go into the shipping sector?

At some point, we will have to see – and tell – the truth. Attracting young people to a maritime career is not going to be done with NSRF grants nor with elegant words. If the ship-owning community doesn’t want to see Greekowned ships (whose numbers are in any case decreasing) crewed only by foreign sailors, it will need to find other ways to approach young people.

The state-monopoly model of maritime education is bankrupt. If the Greek ship-owning community wants Greeks on the ships, it can secure them by demanding a way forward for non-state maritime education. Private enterprise is more familiar with the rules of marketing than the unwieldy and hidebound public sector.

Letta Dimopoulou - Makri