JKUAT wins bid to host international maritime centre

The International Maritime Organisation has chosen Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) to host the Maritime Technology Cooperation Centre for the African region.

The project, funded by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the IMO, seeks to help mitigate harmful effects of climate change.

The university will host the centre in collaboration with Kenya Ports Authority and Kenya Maritime Authority (KMA). The centre will be stationed at JKUAT, Mombasa campus, and KMA’s Regional Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (RMRCC) located at Mombasa port.

JKUAT was selected due to its track record in training, research and innovation in agriculture, engineering and technology.

The university also provides degree courses related to maritime shipping with a track record of regional maritime capacity building activities.

The selection followed a competitive international tendering process, IMO said in a statement posted on its website. The university centre is one of five such institutions globally whose establishment is estimated to cost 10 million euros (Sh1.1 billion).

In December last year, IMO announced that Shanghai Maritime University in China will host the Maritime Centre Asia, while the University of Trinidad and Tobago will host the Caribbean unit. Two more facilities will be established in Latin America and the Pacific to form a global network of such centres.

“The five regional (maritime centres) will deliver the agreed project milestones over a three-year period, making a significant contribution to IMO’s continuing, widespread efforts to ensure effective implementation and enforcement of the global energy-efficiency regulations for international shipping,” IMO said.

“The (centres) will receive allocations from the €10 million European Union funding. They will be established and resourced to become regional centres of excellence, providing leadership in promoting ship energy-efficiency technologies and operations, and the reduction of harmful emissions from ships,” it added.

The centres, according to IMO, will go a long way in mitigating the effects of greenhouse gas emissions from the shipping industry which are expected to rise especially in developing countries which play a significant role in international shipping, but lack the means to improve energy efficiency in their shipping sectors.

“This project, formally entitled Capacity Building for Climate Change Mitigation in the Maritime Shipping Industry, will enable developing countries, especially least developed countries and small island developing states, to effectively implement energy-efficiency measures through technical assistance, capacity building and promoting technical cooperation,” said IMO.