Six out of 107 flag states came through without remark on this year’s Flag State Performance Table. The table is issued yearly by the Round Table of international shipping associations Bimco, ICS, Intercargo, Intertanko and ISF.
The six states are Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Isle of Man and Norway. As usual, Sweden gets a remark for the high age of the Swedish fleet. Finland has two remarks, but like before they are due to not being on the Tokyo MOU white list and not being a part of the US Coast Guard Qualship 21 programme, and the explanation is that no Finnish-flagged ships traffic Japanese or US waters.
Last year, four states had no negative indicators on the table. Since then, Hong Kong and UK have got remarks while France, Greece, Isle of Man and Norway have improved their performance. Denmark and Germany were spotless also in 2009.
The Round Table warn against thirteen flag states that have twelve or more negative indicators. The states are Albania, Bolivia, Cambodia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cote d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Georgia, Honduras, Lebanon, St Kitts and Nevis, São Tomé and Príncipe and Sierra Leone.
The 19 criteria of the table consist of port state control performance, ratification of conventions, classification by non-IACS classification societies, the age of the fleet, reports to ILO and IMO and IMO attendance.