IIMS turns a friendly face to ports

The International Institute of Marine Surveyors (IIMS) is promoting itself as the 'local contact for marine surveying operations' for ports in the Middle East, Australia and India.

Formed in 1991, it is only in the last five years that the expansion of the Institute has really taken off.

“The expansion is now happening rapidly,” explained John Lawrence, chief executive of the IIMS to Port Strategy, who goes on to say that one of the early – and useful – requests was from the harbour master of Fujairah port to the new local UAE office.

“He just wanted the surveyors to wear identifiable hazard jackets – so they wouldn’t be confused with other people in the port, Fujairah is truly huge. It was a simple enough action to take by the members on the spot, and saves the port authority a lot of work checking on people – we would have had difficulty trying to implement it from our office in the UK.”

Mr Lawrence went on to say that local difficulties need local input – and no end of good ideas from outside the area will substitute for asking people with knowledge of regional rules and regulations, habits - and personalities.

He added: “We have opened three Branch offices so far, with one in Mumbai on the cards for October. It has been a success already: the conference we ran in Australia on new technology and legislation was based on asking people what the issues in that part of the world actually were. It’s resulted in take up, not just on a state, but a federal level by the Australian Government who are now requesting the IIMS’s input.”

(Source: Port Strategy)