May-June 2012 - The International Organization of Masters, Mates ...

WAshington Observer
Protecting Our Industry
Through Advocacy in Washington and on the Home Front
MM&P members, union officials and representatives
of MM&P-contracted companies
were part of a 155-person group that visited
the offices of 170 members of Congress on
May 9 to call attention to the important role
played by the American maritime industry in
our country’s security, economy and national
defense. The meetings were part of the third annual
Maritime Industry Congressional Sail-In.
In discussions with members of Congress and their
staffs, Sail-In participants underlined the importance of
the Jones Act, the Maritime Security Program (MSP) and
cargo preference laws. A major focus of the discussions: the
hundreds of thousands of Americans who work directly or
indirectly for the U.S.-flag fleet and the contributions they
make to our nation’s economy.
“No industry has been more vital to the success of our
country than America’s maritime industry,” according to a
report released in conjunction with the Sail-In by the Navy
League of the United States. “Our U.S.-flag fleet provides
jobs for hundreds of thousands of ‘Maritime Americans’
in every corner of our nation: from longshoremen in ports
along our four seacoasts, to towboat operators navigating
the Mississippi, to shipbuilders in East Coast dry docks, to
the men and women who crew American-flag vessels of all
types.”
The report, “America’s Maritime Industry: The
Foundation of American Seapower,” is an unprecedented
look at our industry as a whole. It describes the relationships
among industry participants and explains why weakening
any one of the key maritime programs that support it would
compromise the entire U.S.-flag fleet.
Supporting our forces overseas
The Sail-In aims to educate legislators and their staffs on a
number of topics. Few people outside the maritime industry
are aware, for example, that our government has dramatically
increased its reliance on privately owned U.S.-flag
commercial vessels and civil service mariners for the sealift
capability needed to deploy and sustain U.S. forces overseas.
Since 2008, as noted in the Navy League report, the share
of dry cargo moved by U.S.-flag commercial vessels and
C. James Patti
their civilian American crews has increased to 95
percent.
The American maritime industry moves
cargo and troops around the world in far greater
volume and with far greater efficiency than
any other transportation mode. “Whether by
U.S.-flag vessels in commercial service or by
U.S.-government or chartered American ships, since
2004 virtually 100 percent of all equipment and supplies
for our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan has been transported
by U.S.-flag ships manned by U.S. citizen mariners,” the Navy
League says.
These statistics demonstrate a fundamental truth of which
we in the maritime industry are well aware: that the Maritime
Americans who own, operate and crew the U.S.-flag fleet guarantee
that our forces overseas have what they need to do their
jobs on our behalf. A major goal of the Sail-In is to get the word
out: to legislators in Washington and to the public at large.
Feeding the world’s hungry
Few people outside the maritime industry are aware that many
of the same companies and individuals who transport supplies
to our forces overseas are also engaged in international relief
efforts. America is, in fact, the world’s largest provider of food
aid. Through the Food for Peace Program, since 1954 more than
three billion people in 150 countries have benefitted from the
generosity of the American people.
Just as Maritime Americans deliver the goods to American
troops, they deliver the food that feeds the world’s hungry and
advances America’s longstanding humanitarian objectives. In
the words of the Navy League, Maritime Americans are the ones
who “ensure U.S. food aid reaches people in need, and in the
process generate international goodwill, building connections
between the United States and developing nations.” Participants
in the Sail-In are working to spread the word about the importance
of food aid cargos that move by sea.
An essential source of jobs
The Jones Act, the body of law that ensures that America’s
domestic trades are served by American vessels and crews, is of
inestimable importance to our military, economic and homeland
security, as well as to our national and local tax base. Along with
May - June 2012 - 8 - The Master, Mate & Pilot