The Albanian-Greek maritime border in the Straits of Corfu region and the Ionian Sea reflects a complicated geographical, historical, and political reality, which constitutes a special characteristic of the Balkan Peninsula coastal region as a whole. For many centuries, the navigational routes of the Strait of Otranto and the Corfu Channel were characterized as important strategic, military, and commercial seaways for the ancient peoples of the region. In this respect, even though the Albanian-Greek southern border region has been at the center of conflicts and disagreements between these countries for many years, the problem is not thought to be completely related to the specific delimitation of the maritime borderline. The interstate maritime boundary is official and internationally recognized and is shown on all official political maps as an international borderline. The Albanian-Greek borderline is a product that came as a result of the Balkan Wars and the First World War, in which there was a great involvement and influence of the Great Powers’ diplomacy. Nowadays, the possibility of Albania-Greece interstate conflicts over the southern border area and maritime borders exists. In this context, ethnographic complexity is considered problematic due to the existence of the Greek minority in Albania, as well as Albanian immigrants living in Greece. On the other hand, the natural resources that possess the maritime regions of the Corfu Channel and the Ionian Sea are another reason for the dispute over the maritime border. However, according to US security institutions, these cross-border disputes between these states may only remain at the political level and not degrade further.

Greek shipping is the world’s leading power and is well known for its efficiency and performance. The Greek fleet represents almost 21% of the global fleet in terms of capacity (deadweight tonnes – dwt) and 60% of the European Union’s one (Union of Greek Shipowners, 2023). Apart from the entrepreneurship competence of Greek shipowners, the contribution of Greek seafarers to the development of the so-called “Greek maritime miracle" has been decisive. Greek seafarers are known for their seamanship, qualities as well as their skills. However, according to data from the Hellenic Statistical Authority, the number of Greek seafarers is diachronically decreasing. Indicative of this trend is the fact that from 2000 to 2020, the number of Greek seafarers employed in Greek-owned vessels reduced by 45% (18.450 in 2000 vs. 10.087 in 2020). The aim of this research is twofold: first, to identify the reasons for the decreasing trend in the number of the Greek seafarers and, second, to highlight the initiatives and other actions the Greek shipping community could adopt in order to attract highly qualified seafarers to the Greek-owned fleet. In this context, a qualitative study was conducted, the purpose of which was to investigate the views of industry's stakeholders, in respect to the factors that shape the downward trend of seafarers figures. The outcome of this study sheds light on the reasons affecting the attractiveness of seafaring profession and further actions required for addressing promotion gaps.

Radio waves, the spectrum of the electromagnetic waves, are all around us and in most cases have only one purpose. The maritime Automatic Identification System (AIS) uses Very High Frequency (VHF) radio waves for the purpose of data exchange between ships and shore stations. These data exchanges take place during certain time intervals, resulting in intermittent emission of electromagnetic waves. In the research presented in this paper, the objective was to add a new purpose for the AIS electromagnetic waves, i.e. to act as a power source for the RF energy harvester. After collecting the electromagnetic waves of the AIS system, the signals’ voltage is rectified, amplified and delivered to the load. In this paper, the process of radio wave energy harvesting is simulated in the Multisim software and analyzed in detail. The results of the analysis showed a multiple increase in the voltage value at the output of the RF energy harvester.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is an emerging strategy for organizations to secure their status in the market that they serve. It is thought that the increase in CSR activities within and outside the organization, especially for maritime organizations, will positively affect the image of the institution. The current research aims to reveal the relationship between CSR perceptions of the employees in the maritime industry and corporate image (CI), employee satisfaction (ES), employee loyalty (EL) and word of mouth (WOM). The data obtained through a questionnaire from 284 office workers in a Turkish ship-owner company were tested with the Structural Equation Model using SPSS 24.0 AMOS 21.0 statistical package program. As a result, it was found that there is a positive relationship among CSR and ES, CI, WOM and EL. In addition, it has been concluded that CSR has a very high effect on CI, also CI has a very high effect on WOM communication.

Safety analysis of complex technical systems currently operating in the transport sector is an urgent challenge for the global maritime industry, which suffers from a lack of information about the levels of risk and the consequences of their incorrect assessment. Among the requirements for vessel management and operations the importance of having a highly professional crew and up-to-date navigational equipment. Navigational safety is one of the components of the integral concept of “safety” for a seagoing ship. Assessment of integral safety is based on assessments of the individual safety components. In this study, the focus is on “navigational safety”, which is primarily understood as ensuring safe operation of a vessel in specific navigation conditions, ensuring safe control and maneuvering of the vessel, ship position monitoring, heading control, sufficient depth margin under the keel along the route, taking into account its actual draft and subsidence in shallow water, and sea disturbance. In the offered research on the basis of the identified states of navigational safety, the graphic model of process and matrix of transition probabilities in the general form with use of homogeneous Markov model of change of navigational safety of a vessel, with discrete time and presence of absorbing state is formed. The proposed Markov process model can be used to assess vessel navigational safety when establishing possible states of navigational safety with significant probability to assess ship safety and make decisions to ensure safe vessel operation.

The enhancement of world maritime shipping leads to increasing of the time required for transit passage and impossibility of old locks in Panama Canal to serve the newest vessel’s generation. Many states in east and south-eastern part of the country, as Florida, Georgia, Virginia and South Carolina, are becoming attractive for business. They have made various investments and improvements in regional transport infrastructure to dominate over freight traffic in the region, such as dredging of port entrances and port basins, expansion of container terminals, and improving inland transport connections to the port. The goal of this article is to study how the design and construction of new set of locks on the Panama Canal affects to the global trade and further to the multimodal chains, transport infrastructure and ports along the East American Coast.

Liner shipping, which offers the door-to-door transportation service, has pre-determined departure, arrival and transfer ports and carries cargo mainly through container ships, has been playing a key role in the global cargo transportation industry for more than 60 years and is still growing rapidly. Therefore, understanding of the relationship between service quality, customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions in liner shipping is of critical importance for global competition. From this standpoint, this study aims to determine whether customer satisfaction creates an alternative effect through its mediating effect on the causal relationship between core service quality and customers’ behavioral intentions in liner shipping sector. To do so, it obtains data through survey from forwarder companies that operate in Turkey and analyzes the obtained data using SPSS v22 and AMOS v22 statistical package software. This study concludes that core service quality has a positive effect on customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions, and that customer satisfaction has a mediating effect on the relationship between core service quality and behavioral intentions. It reveals that core service quality and customer satisfaction are important constructs for future behavioral intentions. In conclusion, this study suggests that business managers in liner shipping sector need to incorporate core services that will positively affect customer satisfaction in their marketing policies, and to engage in managerial activities that enhance customer satisfaction.

The paper presents and processes data on inspections of the individual Memoranda (regions) and compares the overall number of ship detention cases. Also, the paper identifies the differences in various regions in the same period as well as their causes and consequences. Container traffic plays a key role in the international trade. Therefore, the research is based on a comparison of the inspection statistics (in general) and the ship detentions share with the total number of inspections and detentions of the container vessels for each region and the same period. The data have been collected from the annual reports of the individual Memoranda (regions), covering a five-year period, from 2015 to 2019. The results of the research have pointed to partially successful attempts to harmonize and standardize the inspection procedures, as well as to the problem of the non-existent uniformed inspection system.

The transportation of steel scrap cargoes in global trade has been increasing over the years. According to the researches, the demand of steel scrap materials will be more than double in the late 21st century whereby forecasting of steel scrap production and so steel scrap cargo operations will also evenly rise in ports. Increasing steel scrap cargo operations will bring along several undesirable accidents and injuries. Investigations show that the most paramount reason for these incidents or accidents related with steel scrap cargo operations in maritime sector is human error. In this sense, it is aimed to identify human error probabilities (HEPs) for steel scrap cargo operation that is performed frequently in maritime sector, especially in bulk carrier vessels. In this study, Success Likelihood Index Method (SLIM), which is one of the methods for Human Reliability Analysis (HRA), is used to determine HEPs in steel scrap cargo operations due to the limited data availability on this topic. Accordingly, the most common error modes that are determined via detailed literature review are ranked in accordance with HEP values. It is put forward which and how much error mode is affected from Performance Shaping Factor (PSF) such as education, supervision, environmental condition, equipment and tool condition, and experience mostly. According to the analysis results, “the falling piece of steel scrap on the deck during steel scrap loading or unloading operation” has the most probability occurrence. Consequently, it is understood that training and experience factors are critically important for preventing errors in steel scrap cargo operation in overall view. On the other hand, environmental condition, supervision, and equipment and tool condition factors include the prominent level of significance to bring down the probability of accruing of some specific errors. Accordingly, the proposed approach not only make a theory-based contribution to the maritime literature, but also to active contribution to the sector involving P&I Clubs, shipping companies, and classification societies toward focusing point for minimizing the accidents about steel scrap cargo operations.

Compliance with modern environmental norms and regulations is an increasingly important requirement in the shipbuilding process of ship design and construction. Related to the ship production process, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), nitric oxides and particulate matter are the main emissions of harmful gases in the shipyard. This paper analyzes air emissions from the ship production process in a shipyard. Air emissions are quantified from either in-situ measurements from emission sources, or by materials that are used in the shipbuilding process, and the acquired data from those measurements is calculated as yearly emissions. Emission quantities of VOCs, nitric oxides, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and particulates are analyzed regarding possible reduction techniques considering efficiency and investment costs for using these methods. In conclusion, the best available and feasible emission reduction methods are suggested, and a suggestion for achieving the goal of a net zero emission shipyard.