NAUTILUS P01 NOVEMBER 2009.qxd - Nautilus International

24 | telegraph | nautilusint.org | November 2009 November 2009 | nautilusint.org | telegraph | 25
WATER FREIGHT
Nautilus officials Rob Pauptit and
Marcel van den Broek with NL
committee member Jan de Rover
10 facts on
waterways
z half of Europe’s population lives within
a few miles of the coast or the continent’s 15
largest rivers
z Europe has some 38,000km of navigable
waterways — with half of the network
accessible to ships over 1,000 tonnes
z inland waterway vessels carry some 6.6%
of freight volumes within the EU — but up
to 42% in countries such as the Netherlands,
Belgium and Germany with extensive inland
navigation systems
z each year, waterways carry over 485m
tonnes of freight within the EU
z inland shipping is the largest carrier of
building materials in Europe, with a share of
39%, and is an important carrier of cereals,
agricultural products, solid fuels and ores
z around 80% of all transported hazardous
goods are shipped by inland waterways
z the largest growth of inland navigation
traffic in recent years has been container and
general cargo traffic
z average inland shipping vessels consume
four to seven times less fuel per tonne-km than
lorries
z the Netherlands has a commercial inland
navigation network totalling some 2,200km
z three of Europe’s most important
waterways — the Meuse, Rhine, and Scheldt
— enter the sea through a common delta in the
SW of the Netherlands
As the
“ biggest voice
for workers
in the
industry,
we take
a leading
role in EU
discussions
”
Leading role for Union
Nautilus International is the biggest
Munion representing inland waterway
workers in Europe — and is stepping up
its work to protect their jobs and working
conditions.
‘As the biggest voice for workers in
the industry, we take a leading role in
EU discussions affecting the sector,’ says
assistant general secretary Marcel van den
Broek.
‘We are deeply involved with the ITF
and ETF, and in social dialogue in setting
standards for the industry — especially in the
areas of training and education,’ he adds.
‘Whilst there are some sector-specific
problems, there are also many issues that
are similar to ocean-going shipping — such
things as workloads and hours of work and
rest — and we are active in addressing
these,’ he says.
Nautilus presently has five collective
bargaining agreements with major inland
navigation employers. These help to
set decent pay and conditions, pensions
and leave — and the Union is seeking to
secure more of these. ‘We would like to get
everyone covered by CBAs,’ says Marcel.
In recent months, Nautilus has worked
with employers to secure funding and
create new training and education courses
for Dutch inland navigation workers who
were partially unemployed as a result of the
economic downturn.
Nautilus also has a ship visitor who
maintains frequent contact with the crews of
inland navigation vessels.
Top: Europe’s huge waterfreight network
Below: the green credentials of waterfreight vessels
Graphics: Inland Navigation Europe
Four grades of iron ore cargo being
carried in the Veerhaven IX’s barges
The Netherlands shows
the way in making water
work. Andrew Linington
sees members deliver...
C
It’s early morning on a damp, grey and chilly
Rotterdam morning as the Veerhaven IX moves
off a berth at Dintelhaven, on the outer edge of
Europort, to begin another voyage that will help keep the
wheels of European industry in motion.
If you wanted to find a vessel to demonstrate the value
of inland navigation to the EU economy, you could do no
better than this. One of a fleet of seven ‘push-barges’, it
helps to operate a non-stop shuttle service feeding one of
Europe’s biggest steel mills with the raw products required
to produce high quality steel for vehicle manufacturers
and other vital industries.
Attached to the push-boat unit are anything up to six
barges lashed together with steel ropes tensioned by
winches, with a total capacity of up to 16,500 tonnes. The
environmental credentials are significant — each voyage
takes anything between 440 to 660 lorries off the roads of
the Netherlands and Germany. Over a year, Veerhaven IX
will make some 200 trips and can carry as much as 2m
tonnes of cargo.
The voyage to Duisburg takes as long as 28 hours,
depending on river and loading conditions, and at the German
berth the barges are uncoupled to be discharged
while Veerhaven IX lashes up empty barges for the 12-hour
trip back downstream.
Built in 1999, Veerhaven IX is one of the newest vessels
in the company’s fleet and one of the largest operating on
the Rhine — up to 269.5 long and 22.8m wide when pushing
six barges. Powered by three Mak engines, developing
5,400hp, the vessel has three propellers, three rudders and
two bow thrusters.
The fleet runs 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and today
the vessel has four part-loaded barges, each filled with a
different grade of iron ore from Brazil. The part-loading is
a reflection of a the way in which Veerhaven IX and the
thousands of other vessels that operate on the European
mainland’s major waterways serve as something of as a
barometer for the state of the economy.
When the downturn kicked in earlier this year, the owning
company — Thyssenkrupp Veerhaven BV — had to
temporarily lay up a couple of vessels and some of its 154
crew members had to use up leave while work was
reduced.
Now — thanks largely to the German support for scrapping
old cars — things have picked up and the fleet is fully
employed again. A new vessel, Veerhaven XI, is due to be
delivered next year.
But, just like deepsea shipping, the inland navigation
industry depends upon healthy trade levels to remain
buoyant — and at the moment it is the same story of too
much tonnage chasing too little trade.
Veerhaven IX’s crew members reckon their sector is
presently some 30% over-supplied with vessels — and
that’s a major challenge for the 14,000 people who work in
the Dutch inland navigation industry.
Like their deepsea counterparts, inland navigation
crews are a special type of worker — needing specialist
skills to operate their vessels safely and efficiently in sometimes
difficult conditions.
‘Vessels can pass within 10m of each other, which would
be a near-miss at sea,’ says Jan de Rover, a Nautilus International
NL committee member who works in the Thyssenkrupp
Veerhaven fleet. ‘Often the river can be congested,
and there may be very strong currents, low water levels
and fog so thick that you cannot see the barges in front.
You need to be very skilled to run the ship safely in these
conditions, and it takes a long time to learn those skills and
to learn to read the river and its currents.’
Even though the Dutch inland navigation system is the
busiest in Europe, it has a remarkably good safety record
— with a fatality rate of close to zero in recent years. ‘Accidents
are very rare,’ says Jan de Rover. ‘They usually happen
in fog or when there is low water and the channel
becomes very narrow.’
The push-tugs are classed and inspected every five
years, while the crew members work under a carefully
regulated certificate system, with navigators needing to
have a certificate for each section of the Rhine on which
they operate. It can take more than 10 years to qualify as a
captain.
Thyssenkrupp Veerhaven crew members work a two
weeks on/two weeks off rota, with an additional 20 days of
annual leave, and Veerhaven IX runs with two captains,
two mates, a cook, one sailor and an engineer when pushing
four barges and with an additional sailor when six
barges are attached.
Thyssenkrupp Veerhaven is one of the companies
whose crews are on conditions regulated by an agreement
with Nautilus International. But the inland navigation
sector — like international shipping — is fiercely competitive,
with increasingly intense pressures affecting operators
and crews.
Many of the vessels operating on the inland waterways
are ‘privateers’ — often run by husband and wife teams,
supplemented by a professional crew member, for whom
the vessel is a home as well as their business. Recent years
have seen a big influx of new tonnage, and with the economic
downturn the market has been hit by over-capacity.
In response to the tough conditions, operators are trying
to cut their costs. One example was a private company
that sought to change crews’ working rotas from 14 days
on/14 days off to 21 days on/seven days off.
And, just like deepsea shipping, the inland navigation
sector is also feeling the chill wind of cut-throat competition
in the form of flags of convenience and crews from
low-cost countries.
‘We have had problems with some owners putting vessels
onto the Luxembourg flag, and we have also seen Maltese-flagged
vessels,’ said Jan de Rover. ‘Some of them are
now starting to use Filipino or even Chinese crews.’
There are also concerns that the influx of eastern European
crews is creating problems with communications in
the sector, where German is presently the language used
to navigate with. And there are also fears that the longstanding
Rhine Agreement regulating conditions in the
industry is at risk.
WATER FREIGHT
Oiling the
wheels of
Europe...
The Veerhaven IX, left, and the Alsvin, below, show the
versatility of waterfreight Pictures: Andrew Linington
‘It used to be the case that everyone was paid the rate for
the job, but now the fear is that it will change and people
will be paid at the rate of their own country,’ Jan de Rover
says.
Peter Buur, Thyssenkrupp Veerhaven fleet manager,
raises another concern that parallels deepsea shipping —
the future supply of crews. ‘’We are fortunate in having
good people who stay with us for many years,’ he says, ‘but
it is getting more difficult to get people, especially last year
when business was booming. Young people seem less
interested in the job now, and also many of the private
owners with one or two vessels take lots of the people coming
out of the schools.’
Despite the present pressures, Europe’s inland navigation
industry and vessels like Veerhaven IX deserve to be
facing a rosy future in these environment-conscious
days.
Ironically — given its ‘green’ merits — inland navigation
has been suffering from the first effects of climate
change, with the longer-lasting low water levels in the
summers making navigation more difficult and placing
draft restrictions on the vessels.
Experts suggest that if all the freight presently shipped
by inland waterways was carried by road, atmospheric
emissions in Europe would be at least 10% higher — and
there is significant potential to shift more freight to water,
in stark contrast to the congested road network.
‘When you look around us, you see vessels on the waterways
carrying all the things that go on ocean-going ships
— cars, containers, bulk cargoes and more,’ says Jan de
Rover. ‘We really are the missing link in the European
transport chain.’