Honorable Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen.

　I am honored today to be able to address the WMU Japan Sasakawa Fellows.

　

　After graduating from WMU, many of you have gone on to ocean-related careers in your respective countries. With this in mind, I would like to talk today about the importance of ocean issues, especially as regards marine transport, and the initiatives we are taking in these areas.

　

It is said that the oceans are the birthplace for all life, and there can be no doubt of the ancient dependence of man on the ocean. The frequent discovery of mounds of ocean fish bones and shells attest to this dependence, as does the discovery of a large ocean going vessel beside the pyramids, which is now on display. At whichever period we look, there has always been an intimate connection between man and the sea.

　

　This connection has expanded on a global scale in the last fifty years however, especially in the use and development of marine transport, fisheries, seabed minerals, the coastal zone, and recreation and leisure activities. And while the role of information technology is often emphasized in the recent globalization must rely on the support of a worldwide distribution network, and that this network is only possible with marine transport.

　

　At the same time, the last half of the 20th century was also a period when it became clear that there are limits to the ocean's regenerative powers. We have learned that what we once thought were the ocean's infinite powers to tolerate mankind's unrestricted use of the oceansÅ＼including the deposit of waste material-are in fact limited and that the ocean environment indeed reacts sensitively to how it is used. We know now that if we are careless in our use and exploitation of the oceans there is a high risk that we will even undermine our base of survival, through marine pollution, destruction of the environment, and exhaustion of mineral resources. Based on these, mankind has come to share the following four convictions:

　

　

　These convictions were made especially clear and given concrete from in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and the Rio Summit. The international framework and body of rules adopted in 1982 at the 3rd Conference on the Law of the Sea, which took effect in 1994. Also, in 1992, at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, a declaration for sustainable development was made and the action plan Agenda 21 adopted. Chapter 17 of the action plan deals with the ocean and coastal zones, and stipulates what actions should be taken by individual countries for the conservation of resources as well as for sustainable development. These led further more, after consideration by the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development, to an annual review of ocean issues in the U.N. General Assembly and the establishment of the United Nations informal Consultative Process on the Oceans and the Law of the Sea. You are all aware of course, of the RioÅ{ 10 conference to be held in Johannesburg, South Africa next year.

　

　In other words, there has been a fundamental shift in thought regarding mankind's use of the oceans, from the Freedom of the Seas principle in which unrestricted use of the oceans were accorded to everyone, to an Ocean Governance principle in which people's activities on the ocean are subject to management. The challenge for us in the 21st century is how to translate Ocean Governance from theory into fact, and from lists of program regulations into an effective means of ocean stewardship.

　

(The Need for Developing Personnel Having Professional Knowledge and Skills)

In comparison to other fields related to the exploitation and use of the oceans, marine transport is a pioneering field in its global approach. With oceans covering 71% of the surface of the earth, human activity has from the beginning owed a great deal to marine transportation. It's no exaggeration to say that even the airplane industry has little affected this, as 99% of trans-ocean distribution is still carried out by ship.

　

　These have been many international initiatives taken in the past to secure the safety as well as efficiency of marine transport. One of the most famous of these is the SOLAS Convention (International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea), which took effect in 1929, in response to the tragedy of the Titanic, which sank after colliding with an iceberg in the North Atlantic. In the latter half of the twentieth century the UN agency specializing in ocean issues, the IMO, originally the IMCO, undertook technological and legal reviews of maritime safety and anti-pollution practices, resulting in the enactment of many conventions, for example: a revised Solas Convention, an international convention on prevention of pollution by ships(MARPOL73/78), the Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and other Matter (the London Convention), and the International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watch-keeping For Seafarers (the STCW Convention).

　

　As this shows, many international conventions concerning maritime safety and marine environment protection issues have been established for marine transport. An obvious problem arises however when time comes for their implementation. No matter how many agreements are made regarding these issues, if the signatory countries do not have the capacity to implement them, we are only building castles in the air. Specialized Knowledge as well as technical skills is needed to implement ocean related conventions. Unfortunately, many signatory nations, especially among the developing nations, do not have sufficient personnel with this necessary knowledge and expertise. What are urgently needed are capacity building initiatives to remedy this situation.

　

(Founding of WMU and The Nippon Foundation Support)

　

One of these initiatives, of course, is the World Maritime University, founded as a graduate school university in 1983 by the IMO, to provide advanced education and training in ocean affairs to those involved in maritime activities in their respective home countries, especially to those from developing countries. The next hurdle was how to make the university accessible to those for whom it was intended, maritime personnel from developing nations. The Nippon Foundation, as a Japan based non-profit NGO, has provided financial support for maritime safety and marine environmental protection projects since its beginning in 1962. It has also been actively involved in personnel development and training activities. On realizing the importance and potential of the WMU initiative, and after having been approached by the international Maritime Organization, it was decided in 1987 to establish the Sasakawa Fellowship, which provides scholarships for students to attend the World Maritime University. We currently provide fifty scholarships a year, to twentyfive students each in the first and second years of the degree program. Since its founding, the total number of students to have studied at WMU on Japanese scholarships, many Sasakawa fellowships, has now risen to 208, including current students.

　

　The WMU has produced solid results in the education and training of maritime personnel form developing countries, exceeding even the expectations of the international maritime society. We are happy to report that the WMU Master's degree program is now recognized internationally for its educational excellence, due in large part to the hard work of Rector laubstein, his faculty, and stuff.

　

(Developments and Changes in Marine Transport and Related Areas)

As it has been almost twenty years since the founding of the WMU, I would like to review here some of the developments and changes in marine transport and related areas in the past two decades, and then talk on the outstanding maritime safety problems we face.

　

　First of all, there have been changes in the quantity as well as quality of maritime transport. Trade has increased due to globalization and the specialization of economics, bringing about a more than 50% increase in the quantity of goods shipped by sea. Safer, more effective, as well as more economical methods have been developed to meet to new needs in the shipment of raw materials and energy resources, automobiles, and containers. In the field of container services especially, dramatic developments are underway in information management, increased container ship size, and the formation of global alliances.

　

　Secondly, there is the growth of the East Asian region. Regardless of the recent financial crisis, we are all agreed that the countries of East Asia had amazing economic growth during the last past of the twentieth century, and now constitute one of the world's major production and distribution centers. In looking at the movement of goods on the world's container liner service routes, the routes between East Asia and North America, East Asia and Europe, and the inter-Asian route continue to dominate the first three positions, far exceeding the goods moved on the fourth busiest route, that between North America and Europe. These conditions are also reflected in the amount of container handled in ports, with the Asian ports of Hong Kong, Singapore, Kao-hsing, and Pusan being the leading harbors. Not only container freight alone, but oil, iron ore and other raw materials and energy resources are also major items of import into Asia, where they are turned into a vast array of manufactured products and then exported, almost all by ocean transport.

　

　Thirdly, there have been major changes in the mainstays of marine transport with the coming of internationalization. The traditional model, in which a country could use a domestic maritime shipping company operating a ship registered in that country, and using seafarers trained in that country, is now, in the face of the fierce competition of a single global market, a thing of the past. It is the usual practice now for ships to be registered under a flag of convenience, for ship management companies to divide up their operations, and to man their ships using the inexpensive labor market of developing countries. An especially worrisome problem is that ships registered under a flag of convenience are often not sufficiently regulated in safety and other matters by the states where they are registered.

　

(Outstanding maritime safety problems)

Among these developments and changes in marine transport and related areas, there have also arisen many problems. I would like to look now at some of the current problems involving maritime safety.

First is the problem of sub-standard ships. Those ships that do not observe certain safety standards present a threat not only to maritime safety but to the protection of the environment as well. While it is the responsibility of the state where a ship is registered to make sure she observes maritime safety and environmental protection regulations, it is a fact that among the ships operating on international service routes not all are sufficiently supervised. Furthermore, the rapid growth of ships registering under a flag of convenience has exacerbated this trend. In response to this, a system of Port State Control has been established whereby in addition to the supervision of the state of registry, the port state at which a ship calls can also enforce applicable regulations. PSC is now recognized around the world and has proven to be an important and effective means of eradicating sub-standard ships.

　

　At present, in oceans around the world, individual countries have made Memorandums of Understanding for their region and are applying Port State Control. There are now eight PSC systems in operation, the first resulting from the Paris MOU and the most recent from the Black Sea MOU. The Tokyo MOU, which took effect in April of 1994 and covers Asia and the Pacific, has seventeen member countries and is actively enforced. The Nippon Foundation has provided financial support for Tokyo MOU activities from the beginning, especially for improved training of inspection officers and for secretariat operations.

　

　In the actual enforcement of PSC, however, there is not only the question of ineffectiveness should individual states operate in complete independence, we must also keep in mind the possibility of creating unnecessary impediments to efficient voyages through overlapping inspections. Obviously, to avoid these impediments, close cooperation is needed to create a harmonization of PSC operations throughout the region. The kind of cooperation I have in mind is well informed and substantive, and should be carried out by each and every country. It is here that the shared experience you take back to your countries as graduates of WMU is invaluable, and is the reason we believe effective PSC implementation to be one of the major achievements of the WMU education.

　

I would like to speak next about maritime education and training. A crucial factor in the safety of navigation is the crew. Here, too, as I have already mentioned, we have seen major changes take place in recent years. It is common now for shipping companies from the developed nations to operate their ships with crews made up of various nationalities. In looking at the composition of the available seafarers, we can see that those senior officers from the developed nations who have stayed on until now will soon reach retirement age, and that the trend is to rely more and more on crews from other nations, including senior officers. The situation now demands that multi-national crews who have received their education and training in a variety of countries be able to operate ships safely and efficiently and in accordance with common international practices.

　

　However, the content and level of seafarer education and training conducted in different countries, especially for senior officers, varies widely. Because of this wide variance, even though the manning of a ship is based on a seafarer's possession of a mariner's license, we cannot immediately assume that they will be able to operate a ship safely. It was due to these circumstances that the STCW95 based White List took so long and was so difficult to compile, being finally released after many negotiations last Fall. However, there is said to remain a great disparity among those countries on the White List. It is now essential that further efforts be made to ensure that all countries adhere to the STCW95 as a minimum international standard.

　

　Nevertheless, from the standpoint of an appropriate response to the large changes in the seafarer labor market, the STCW White List represents no more than a first step in bringing education and training and certification into conformity with necessary international standards. In order to cope with these changes and ensure the safety of navigation, there is an urgent need to introduce consistency into the curricula of the maritime education and training programs of maritime universities and training institutions throughout the world. We must aim for homogeneity among these curricula, not of the minimum requirements, but of excellence. Also, these education and training programs must enable students to master leadingedge ship equipment beginning with data communications systems, and recently introduced ship safety management systems.

　

　In order to address these issues cooperatively, 28 leading maritime universities from around the world established the International Association of Maritime Universities (IAMU) in June of 2000. The Nippon Foundation supports the IAMU, in the hope that its researches will not only define the kind of maritime education and training we need in the twenty-first century, but also that the fruits of that research will be directly applied at maritime education and training sites around the world. The second IAMU General Assembly will be held this October in Kobe, Japan.

　

I would like to speak next about the problem of piracy and regional cooperation. Although there is a legal distinction between the terms 'piracy' and 'armed robbery', I will refer to both as piracy here.

　

　Since the mid-nineteen nineties the world 's oceans began to show an increase in piracy, which by the year 2000, according to 1MB statistics, reached 469 incidents in a single year, with the year 2000 showing an increase of 56% from 1999. Attacks that centered on the South China Sea, the Malacca Straits, and the Andaman Sea have shown an especially dramatic increase that shows no signs of slackening. Along with the increase of incidents, the crimes themselves have become more violent and organized. If we allow this trend to continue, marine transport in Asia will suffer great damage. The infestation of pirates is undermining the very basis of Asia's economic growth.

　

(The Need for Regional Initiatives)

　The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which took effect in 1994, standardized the breadth of territorial waters of states at 12 miles and also instituted an arch pelagic waters regime. Under this convention, the Coastal States have vast areas of the sea recognized as part of their territory, and are responsible for the safety of those waters. Responsibility by individual countries for regulating piracy in their territorial waters is the basis of anti-piracy initiatives.

　

　Nevertheless, pirates often operate across states' boundaries as well as on the open seas. As a result of the modern sovereign state putting emphasis on its territory, it now even seems that pirates operate intentionally across the borders in order to evade capture by officials who must give up their pursuit upon entering another country's territory. In order for anti-piracy initiatives to succeed in areas where states' territorial waters and the high seas are intertwined and where there are countless islands for pirates to hide themselves, such as the South China Sea, the Malacca Straits, and the Andaman Sea, there is an especial need for the states in the region to cooperate closely in initiatives that will shut down these border straddling pirates.

　

　One of the difficulties in implementing regional anti-piracy initiatives, however, is the large variety of situations obtaining in the different countries. Given the large differences in the size and complexity of territorial waters, political and economic conditions, dependence on sea transport, organizational structure of maritime law enforcement agencies, and human resources and equipment, fruitful regional coordination and cooperation will not be an easy thing to achieve. On top of this, should one country in the region be faced with a political or economic crisis that prevents it from effectively carrying out its antipiracy measures, state territorial sovereignty would act as a barrier that would severely distort any regional measures in place. And this is of course exactly what the pirates want. Finding the best way to cope with such a situation will be rather difficult, but such are the very situations when it is especially important for the region as a whole to share a common will against piracy, and to strengthen regional cooperation in assistance of the troubled country.

　

(A Proposal for Regional Initiatives to be taken)

　The Regional Conference on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships, which brought together in Tokyo heads of the coast guards and senior maritime policy making representatives from the 15 East Asian countries, did indeed make the year 2000 a memorable year in the drive for concrete measures of cooperation. Unfortunately, however, incidents of piracy have continued to increase. I believe the countries of East Asia, using the network of cooperation begun last year as a base, should discuss ways to further regional cooperation on information exchange, capacity building efforts among the various coast guards, especially in the areas of education and training, and should also work toward mutual assistance in investigation, joint exercise programs, and even coordinated or combined patrolling operations. While any kind of cooperation should always respect the sovereignty of individual nations, I hope that you will agree with me that the time has come for us to take further concrete steps towards a cooperation that is functional as well as purposeful, that will implement coordinated measures to make clear our united stand against piracy in the region, raise awareness about the problem, encourage information sharing, and increase necessary and effective capacities. It is with these objectives in mind, that the Nippon Foundation has since last year supported many regional initiatives among the countries of East Asia, such as the ongoing set of anti-piracy conferences.

　

　

　

　

　

I would next like to speak on one of the most important areas for marine transport, the Malacca Straits. These straits may rightfully be considered a lifeline for Asia, as sixty thousand ships, including tankers, dry bulk carriers, and container ships, pass through them every year. The Malacca Straits are an area of great importance to marine transport, yet a majority of the Straits is comprised of the territorial waters of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea states, however, that in return for passage through the Straits as international waters, User States are asked to cooperate with Littoral States in implementing navigational safety measures.

　

　Recently, the Littoral States have called for a framework for financial cooperation, so that all User States might make reasonable contributions towards the improvement of navigational safety measures in the straits. Given the importance the Straits have as a maritime lifeline for Asia, I believe User States should give due consideration to this request. Among the many User State, Japan is the only one that has cooperated in navigational safety measures in the straits since 1968, with the Nippon Foundation providing the majority of the Japanese founding. There have been many changes regarding states using the Malacca Straits in recent years, and, beginning with the states of Asia, many states other than Japan have become User States. As stipulated in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, I believe a new framework for cooperation that includes User States in maintaining maritime safety in the Straits is now necessary.

　

　This framework for international cooperation would take as its objectives the navigational control of ships through the Straits, the installation, inspection, and maintenance of navigational aids, patrol of the routes and responding to oil spills, and might tentatively be named the international Cooperative Organization for Safety in the Malacca Straits. The Nippon Foundation proposes that the littoral states and User states cooperate to male such a framework materialize.

　

　I am aware that some people in the littoral states are wary that such an international framework might impinge on their national sovereignty, and would prefer that User states simply donate money to a fund to be managed by the Littoral states. However, in order to convince User states to provide financial support, there is a need to form some kind of rational operating framework. In my opinion, moreover, if due consideration is given to matters of sovereignty, discussions between the Littoral and User states can produce a suitable framework which both parties would find acceptable. What is important, however, is that navigational safety in the Straits, essential for Asian development, is achieved, and that littoral and User states agree to cooperate on this, as stipulated in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The issue of cooperation by User states in maintaining navigational safety measures in the Straits has long been the subject of discussion among those states involved, but we think the time has now come to concentrate on what we have in common rather than on our differences, and work together to make such a framework materialize.

　

Although there are many other issues concerning maritime safety that need to be addressed, my time today will not allow me to go into them. Yet I will refer to one more issue for those of you with maritime careers in your country. That is active participation in international conventions. I would like to ask for your efforts towards active participation by your country in international conventions. These are now many important conventions on maritime safety and protection of the environment, but ratification of them is not always as it should be. I have in mind membership in the effective international anti-piracy initiative, the Rome Convention, and regarding, oil spills, the newest CLC and FC, among others. Whether from the point of view of international society or from that of individual countries, these are important maritime conventions, and their importance will only increase as international cooperation develops. As you move forward in your respective careers, I ask you to keep this in mind and work for your country's active participation in these international initiatives and conventions.

　

In conclusion, I would like to speak of our hopes for the WMU Japan Sasakawa Fellows. In the last half of the twentieth century, many countries newly gained their independence, becoming sovereign states. With assumption of this sovereignty, they became accustomed to a system in which they dealt alone with problems occurring within their own territory, while resorting to consultations with international organizations, principally the United Nations, for those problems that could not be adequately dealt with by a single county. In other words, a two-tiered system was given importance, in which problems were addressed from either a national or a global level.

　

　Recently however, this two-tiered system has shown signs that it alone is not effective enough in dealing with many of the problems that we are now facing. Depending on the nature of the problem, we now know that regional initiatives by those countries that are geopolitically affected, or local initiatives by communities in individual states, can sometimes provide more effective solutions. These approaches should be considered in addition to national and global level approaches whenever appropriate. Also, in addition to the traditional main actors, that is, the governmental sector, even more variety of initiatives is now possible by the recent increase in activities of NGO's and the private sector, thus contributing to problem solving.

　

　In maritime society, it is just this kind of multi-tiered and diverse approach that is now being called for. In order to make it work however, each country must develop personnel with the specialized knowledge and skills to participate in such a multi-tiered and diverse approach. It is to accomplish this that The Nippon Foundation provides scholarships for the people of developing countries to attend the World Maritime University.

　

　At Malmo, in the two years of your study together, you learned a great deal about maritime affairs. You also gained a wider perspective and a common understanding, came to appreciate even more the values of reciprocity, harmony, and cooperation. Most important perhaps are the friendships you made there and your inclusion in a worldwide network of like-minded professionals. WMU Fellows are now to be found in countries around the globe, in the maritime affairs offices of governments, in educational institutions, maritime industries, and NGO's.

　

　I urge you to apply what you have learned in seeking solutions to maritime safety and environmental protection problems and to encourage the development of maritime society. Apply your network of connections to these goals as well. From the field of ocean affairs, I urge you to expand the network of cooperation between nations, and work for the peace and development of your region and the world. It is my sincere hope that this occasion, the first assembly of the WMU Sasakawa Fellows, will be the starting point for a new maritime cooperation network and also help to open roads to success in the careers of you all.

　

Thank you for your attention.