Demand for Filipino seafarers to man cruise ships on the rise – Singa Ship

Demand for Filipino seafarers to man cruise ships on the rise – Singa Ship
Carmela I. Huelar December 7, 2022 https://www.manilatimes.net/2022/12/07/business/maritime/demand-for-fili...

ONE of the hardest hit by the pandemic lockdown was the cruise industry. It nosedived because of the travel restrictions, resulting in massive loss of jobs for seafarers onboard vessels, both merchant and cruise.

For Filipino recruitment company Singa Ship Management Philippines President Naconiel de la Torre, the toughest part was braving the difficulties and massive changes that the pandemic ushered in.

Singa Ship, a 35-year-old licensed manning company, supplies Filipino seafarers to cruise and commercial vessels. It is a division of the Singa Group of Companies, which has diverse business interests in Asia with key offices in Singapore and the Philippines.

Singa Ship provides hotel staff and technical crew to cruise line giants such as Cunard, Seabourn, SeaDream, The World and Windstar.

Despite being an established company with massive experience, de la Torre said that like the rest of the global cruise community, the company took a beating when the pandemic hit.The industry however has made a startling comeback.De la Torre said it has surpassed the pre-pandemic level record and is back to "revenue mode."

The company estimated that it has placed 7,000 Filipino seafarers onboard 20 vessels worldwide.De la Torre is optimistic that the recovery of the maritime sector will continue. "The good news is that there are more demands for Filipino seafarers nowadays," he said.

The lockdown that caused a massive breakdown in the cruise industry now has "people thirsting to travel and see more destinations."

"Imagine how we stretched everything to cope up," de la Torre said, referring to the negative effect of the pandemic.

He added that despite the difficulties, "we did not have to retrench employees and seafarers. In fact, the good news is that we're getting more demand."

For cruise ships, some of the growing demand are for hotels, housekeeping and staff for restaurants.De la Torre said that one of the problems at the height of the pandemic was working on the required visas for the crew. He commended the embassies for offering help, particularly the US Embassy.

"They actually made our seafarers a priority," he added.

Asked about some other factors that have caused drastic changes in their deployment of seafarers other than the pandemic, de la Torre pointed out that the cost of sending out the crew to meet the sudden demand has gone up. He said it can be attributed also to the rising price of gas and fuel as a direct result of the Black Sea crisis in Ukraine.

"Our seafarers were out of work for quite some time. But our principals understand and anticipate the problems including the fact that the company has to subsidize a lot of things like medical expenses, visas and the issues with ambulance chasers," he pointed out.

The issue of ambulance chasing has been tackled most recently in the country with several groups and manning associations bringing the issue to the government and demanding that this be given a serious look because it has caused some principals to actually turn away Filipino seafarers because of "questionable" rulings favoring unscrupulous lawyers who take advantage of some of the seafarers.

For a very specific problem in the cruise industry, de la Torre pointed out the shortage of chefs which has seen a sharp rise in demands from clients.

He said that because of the unavailability of jobs at the height of the pandemic, some chefs had to stay on land and look for jobs and ended up putting up their own businesses. Some of them no longer want to go back to sea. "So there's really a high demand to get the best chefs," he stressed.

Asked if there were some stark changes in the hiring process and training of future crew, de la Torre mentioned a closer look at the current English proficiency of Filipino seafarers.

"We are trying to elevate the... proficiency in English of our seafarers," he said.

For a positive change, de la Torre said that the industry is getting more liberated. "Before they were like, no tattoos for any hired crew. But right now, as long as it does not show too much or has no race issues and is not offensive, it is acceptable," he said.

As for the training aspect, he gave assurances that the company is updated with the global shipping community's standards and the new changes as part of adapting to the advent of automation and decarbonization.

Training will most certainly be adjusted to the global shipping's initiatives in upskilling the crew, he said.

De la Torre believes that with the advent of automation and technology, today's new generation of crew is more adept to the changes and is "tech savvy."He said that with all the challenges that face the industry, Singa Ship has always been prepared and ready to hurdle any problem and push to propel the company that helps and empower Filipino seafarers.