European Union and Maritime Law

Petar Kragic, Legal counsel , Tankerska Plovidba dd, Croatia

China as a catch up country has managed to master a breath taking development form its opening to the outside world in late 1970 ties until present times, in which period it established itself as the second economy in the world. This success is the prove that Chinese development policy is efficient and bears fruits. Raise of the Chinese economy changes the landscape of the world’s economy, and the world has to take notice of what is going on. The West and particularly EU still envisage the world’s market as a playground for ’free and fair competition”, without monopolies and state aids and supports which might distort clean completion. However, EU has allowed state aid to shipping in form of tonnage tax and subsidies for innovations which are not mandatory, but it becomes clear that these measures are short of positioning the EU shipping in a competitive mode for the future. China has a comprehensive shipping policy which combines shipyards, control over cargoes, ships’ finance, logistic, manpower and long term strategy. The article argues that EU has to overhaul its shipping policy and add additional measures in support of its fleet; otherwise the future might prove that the current permissible state aid was insufficient and that complacency took away the competitive edge of EU shipping.

Petar Kragic has got MA and PhD in maritime law. He is author of a legal textbook Tanker Charteparties and a number of articles on maritime law topics. He is speaker at maritime conferences. He is titular member of CMI and former chairman of the Croatian Maritime Law Association. He was a member of CMI drafting committee for Rotterdam Rules and a member of the Croatian delegation to UNCITRAL. He is former chairman of the legal committee of Croatian Chamber of Shipping. For a number of years he was director of a major P&I Club and SiGCo. and has been a member of the drafting committee for Croatian maritime law. Mr. Kragic works for Croatian largest ship owning company in which for a number of years he headeds the Legal & Insurance Department, and now is legal counsel for the Company.

Tankerska Plovidba d.d. is a shipping company established in 1955. It operates a fleet of tankers and bulk carriers.