Daniel C. Negron, vice president in the US for Thomas Miller, managers of the TT Club, offers some tips on dealing with the handling problems presented by breakbulk cargoes.
"The immensely superior security and protection afforded to general cargo by containerisation are among its most important benefits, " Negron reminds us. "Unfortunately, though, some shipments, such as large consignments of bagged cargo, just cannot be containerised economically, and therefore we must learn to live with breakbulk cargoes and their associated risks."
Negron was responding to loss prevention comments from the UK P&I Club suggesting that, at some ports, around 5,000 bags will be torn or otherwise damaged by stevedore handling out of a typical 15,000 ton consignment of bagged cargo. Assuming shipment in 25kilo bags, this means that some ports are looking at a loss rate approaching 1% from this cause alone.
In fact, said Negron, this is only one of the causes of loss or damage that can impact on breakbulk shipments and that need attention from shore handlers and port authorities.
TT Club, which numbers many stevedores, handling facilities, as well as port authorities, among its policy-holders, is only too aware of the problems and risks of handling breakbulk cargoes. Although perhaps better known as an insurance provider created to cover the new risks generated by the rise of containerisation and intermodalism, many of the Club's members continue to have significant breakbulk business.
"The three main causes of cargo loss that we see are mishandling, misdirection and misappropriation, " Negron explains. "All three require a particular focus on risk management and perhaps some different priorities compared with the handling of containerised cargoes."
MISHANDLING Mishandling, of the sort depicted in the UK P&I report, "has been with us since time immemorial", remarks Negron, pointing to a general lack of training in the safe and correct handling of breakbulk cargoes, allied to the specific problem of stevedores having to hire labour from an external labour pool at some ports.
"The people from the labour pool are, of course, not the stevedore's own employees and therefore are that much more difficult to control, " he says. "In addition, there may well be no formal training programme in place to ensure best practice in handling the many different types of general cargo a port worker can expect to meet."
Negron suggests that stevedores, as part of their risk management measures, should address breakbulk handling as a special item. "Wherever possible one needs to factor in specially trained people and special security, " he says.
MISDIRECTION Breakbulk cargo is also prone to misdirection, especially at facilities handling multiple consignments where there may be few obvious distinguishing marks to differentiate them. Bagged and other breakbulk cargoes can be mis-stowed, shortlanded, overlanded or even sent to completely the wrong destination, he warns.
"Typical of the misfortunes that befall breakbulk cargoes was a claim we had from South America, " he relates. "Two similar shipments of metal ingots, one destined to New Orleans and the other to Costa Rica, were transposed at the origin port.
Unfortunately the one that should have gone to New Orleans was a much better grade of product, so while the receivers in Costa Rica were very happy at the mistake, the Americans definitely were not.
Special attention to segregation and labelling is clearly a priority."
MISAPPROPRIATION The third vulnerability of breakbulk cargo is theft. This is an area to which stevedores should pay particular attention, according to Negron, since they may well find themselves liable for cargo losses even though, technically, security may be the responsibility of another party.
"We had a case where criminal elements were bleeding coffee out of the shipping bags to take out of a port complex. Even though the ISPS regime has helped port security generally, stevedoring firms still need to assess whether they should actually employ their own people to provide a further layer of protection for these especially vulnerable cargoes."