NMU project extension approved

Written by Gesine Stück  |  Monday, 09 August 2010  | 

The NMU application for project extension was approved by the Steering Committee of the North Sea Region Programme. The project will be extended for 18 months - until June 2012.

The background and motivation of the project extension is driven by the intensive dialogue and feedback from stakeholders in the maritime industry and the opportunities and needs identified during the evolution of the project.

Industry representatives and stakeholders have responded very positively to the NMU approach and the concrete pilot courses during the NMU dialogue with stakeholders e.g. within foresight exercises, industry meetings and conferences. The intensive discussion with stakeholders revealed new strategic needs regarding education specifically for the maritime sector in the North Sea region. Namely the maritime industry demands education content in the fields related to offshore, renewables, bunkering and specific management issues.

Furthermore, the stakeholders identified the overarching challenge of the maritime industry in the NSR as improving the image of shipping and careers at sea and shore. In order to raise the competitiveness and attractiveness of the maritime industry in the NSR for young people and skilled personnel, the image building needs to be improved and intensified. Lifelong career prospects in the NSR maritime clusters, modern lifecycle-oriented career paths particularly managing the link between training and university education, and labour mobility within the framework of an ageing work force must all be improved to compete with other industries.

NMU directly addresses these issues in the project extension phase. Accordingly, the aim of the project extension phase is to develop education content and a strategic framework for the creation, transfer, and integration of knowledge for education to enhance the human factor in the maritime industry and to promote the image of maritime industry.
Taking up the needs of stakeholders from the maritime industry in the NSR, the project extension focuses on:

• Module H: Offshore industry and shipping related to renewable
• Module I: Bunkering - operations, management and technology
• Module J: Cruise shipping - Operations, management, strategies
• Module K: Ferries and MoS – Operations, management, strategies
• Module L: Intercultural Management and Corporate Social Responsibility, organisational behaviour
• Module M: Hinterland management related to port management (virtual ports, dry ports etc.)

Furthermore, the following Executive Module Elements – "Maritime Business 2020 – Can you take the lead?", will be developed: 

• Shipping industry and globalisation - Concentration (horizontal/vertical), changes in trade
• Environment 2020 - Upcoming legislation, air and water environmental problems
• Communication and Information Management
• Human Resources 2020 - Health and safety, intercultural issues, technical Innovation
• Ship Lifecycles Management 2020 - Building, Scrapping, Brokering
• Logistics Challenges 2020
• Risk Management 2020 - Insurance
• Regulatory Environment – overarching

Other issues to be addressed during the project extension are the implementation of the NMU entity and secretariat and the NMU market launch and exploitation.

The project extension uses the momentum of the fruitful and productive cooperation of the NMU network and extends the partnership with the University of Hamburg. 

The new partner has special expertise in applying simulation for educational content development, particularly for interactive education tools for maritime transport to be used as a methodology both within education and research. The University of Hamburg also brings specific expertise in accreditation (i.e. accreditation of work experience in university education) which is of high importance in the development of the NMU continuous professional development (CPD) strategy.