Improving reliability is increasingly regarded as an important topic in maritime transportation, especially given the significant impact that both uncertainty and delays in shipping and at ports have on the efficient flow of freight along wider supply chains. The term ‘reliability’ appears in different academic fields and with a variety of different meanings and interpretations. In transportation, reliability has been studied in most modes, but less so in the case of maritime containerisation. This paper reports on a systematic literature review of the concept of reliability in transportation, with a focus on reliability in container shipping networks. The selected papers were analysed to extract information according to the three identified sub-networks: (1) ports, including studies with a focus on infrastructure, service availability and risks in ports and hinterlands; (2) network structures, including the configuration of the networks, the vulnerability and resilience of the existing networks; (3) supply chains, including connectivity and planning of activities that integrate stakeholders within the supply chain. These sub-networks were then used to further query the database, searching for papers relevant to the research problem. Two research questions are addressed: (1) How is reliability best understood in the context of container shipping networks? (2) What are the determinants that affect container shipping network reliability? The review showed that there is no uniform definition of reliability in container shipping networks, but different approaches to understand it, depending on the theoretical perspective, have been adopted. Influencing factors and relevant metrics are discussed and a framework combining different dimensions of reliability, expressed as three themes, i.e., infrastructure reliability, network configuration reliability, and connectivity reliability, is developed. This can help both practitioners and researchers to understand in more detail the various dimensions and nuances of reliability specifically in the context of container shipping, its interrelationship with wider logistics systems and how, where possible, reliability can be improved.

The Industrial Revolution 4.0 has not left the transportation sector behind. All modes of transportation have, to some extent, already been affected, and maritime is the last to join them. Currently available technology makes autonomous merchant ships a possible alternative to conventional, manned vessels with seafarers. This upcoming shift requires the preparation of necessary policies, such as rethinking obsolete training curricula, in relation to a variety of aspects of the industry, including the future of seafaring as a profession. To formulate such policies, the views of professional seafarers and scholars are sometimes solicited, but the opinions of industry entrants are often neglected. However, the latter may also have some interesting views on the future of their profession, which may be relevant to policy-makers. The results of a worldwide survey, conducted using the Computer-Assisted Web Interviewing (CAWI) method, suggest that the future generation of seafarers fears automation less than their mentors. Although they expect their skills to be useful in automation-driven shipping, they also feel that their Maritime Education and Training institutions (MET) are not doing enough to prepare them for the challenges that the future may hold. This may be due to a lack or poor coverage of shipping autonomization issues in MET curricula, which was mentioned by as many as 41.9% of the respondents. This finding advocates for rethinking the curricula of METs and human resources management in the shipping industry of the future.