Cases involving maritime transport have from time to time been submitted to the ICC Court of Arbitration, in particular where the dispute concerns orders for or construction of a vessel. The number and scope of cases however remained limited since the Rules of the Court are not well adapted to the specific needs of the maritime sector.

A characteristic of maritime arbitration is the greater liberty of action left to the parties compared with commercial arbitration in general. This is made possible by the greater cohesion of maritime interests. In December, 1976, the Council authorised IHQ to prepare special arbitration rules appropriate to the maritime sector in collaboration with the International Maritime Committee (CMI), the Antwerp-based international maritime law association, on the basis of a draft prepared by the Arbitration Commission. The new ICC-CMI Maritime Arbitration Rules were approved by the Arbitration Commission and the CMI Congress earlier in 1978 and now enter into force.

In preparing the Rules the drafters took special account of the need for flexibility. Thus parties are themselves expressly requested to fix the place of arbitration, the law applicable, the number of arbitrators and the language to be used. Only if the parties are unable to agree on these points, or other questions that may arise during an arbitration, is the ICC/CMI Standing Committee on Maritime Arbitration required to take the necessary decisions. The general administration of the new Rules will be provided by the ICC secretariat.

The Standing Committee on Maritime Arbitration is composed of 12 members (including a Chairman and two Vice-Chairmen), six being appointed by each organisation.

The standard arbitration clause recommended runs as follows: “All disputes arising from this contract/Charter Party shall be finally settled in accordance with the ICC-CMI International Maritime Arbitration Rules by one or more arbitrators appointed in accordance with the said Rules”.

The ICC-CMI Rules will shortly be available as Publication 324. (Document 420/215 Rev.)

An immediate and substantial reduction in the use of the world’s 450 sub-standard tankers would take place if charterers acted together to ban the use of these ships, claims the Netherlands Maritime Institute. The number of sub-standard tankers under the Liberian flag is estimated at between 150–200 ships, according to a report published by the institute. And the report says that the proportion of “incidents” with Greek, Liberian, Panamanian and Cypriot tankers is above average. “The main cause identified for this high proportion is poor manning”, adds the report.