Anastasios Papagiannopoulos, CEO of Common Progress, has been elected president of BIMCO, the world’s largest international shipping association, with 2,100 members in more than 120 countries.
According to BIMCO Papagiannopoulos has set three themes for his two-year presidential [ds_preview]term. The first is to promote digitalisation across the industry. BIMCO will be working on a range of projects using convergent technologies to pursue this objective, including applying new advances in software capability to develop a brand new contract editing tool.
Promoting digitalisation will be key to achieving the president’s second theme, which is to reduce the administrative burden for the ship’s master. An administrative burden that BIMCO will be working to lift further through the removal of unnecessary regulations which no longer serve a purpose for the safe operation of ships.
Last but not least, the third theme is to encourage the successful implementation and effective enforcement of new stronger environmental regulations – clarifying the obligations and working to ensure regulations are practical and realistic to implement. BIMCO will help shipowners navigate the Ballast Water Management Convention, by highlighting the key dates and advising on equipment selection and the operational realities. BIMCO will also continue to work with other associations and the IMO to help establish a feasible and practical implementation plan to meet the 2020 global cap on sulphur emissions.
Following Papagiannopolous’s election, BIMCO confirmed that Sadan Kaptanoglu, managing director of HI Kaptanoglu Shipping has been elected as BIMCO’s very first female President Designate.
