The Human Element in Marine Automation

The Marine Transport Workers’ Trade Union of Ukraine, presented by its First Vice Chairman Oleg Grygoriuk, Rector of the National University “Odessa Maritime Academy”, Professor Michael Miyusov, accompanied by Marina Chesnokova, Head of the Academy’s International and Economic Cooperation Department, as well as the students of the NU “OMA” and Kherson State Maritime Academy were also invited to take part in the event.

This large-scale event brought together more than 200 guests from around the globe to discuss the most prominent challenges the maritime industry is facing in the context of automation and digitalization.

The conference was opened by welcoming addresses from the newly elected IMEC Chairman Belal Ahmed and the IMEC Recruitment and Training Committee Chairman Dr. Konstantinos Poulis. The Conference agenda included four sessions. The first session examined technological factors: the automation itself, how ship processes evolved over the past 70 years and how they will change before 2050. The need for development of guidelines for MASS (a ship which, to a varying degree, can operate independently of human interaction) was also raised there.

The third session was focused on the prospects and possible consequences of automation both for shipping in general and for its individual business segments.

The final session on the agenda was a panel discussion with the participation of the cadets. Generation Z was represented by the cadets of the National University “Odessa Maritime Academy” Aleksandr Todorov (Navigation Faculty, 5^th Grade) and Anastasiia Kalynchak (Maritime Law and Management Faculty, 4^th Grade), the cadet of the Kherson State Maritime Academy Yevgenyi Omelianenko (Marine Engineering Department, 4^th Grade) and the cadets of Warsash University Thabit Chourdhury and Tom Sanders. Generation Y representatives who moderated the session were MTWTU First Vice Chairman Oleg Grygoriuk and Adam Lewis, Head of Training & Operations at IMEC.