IMO’s Gender Programme: Women in Maritime Sector

IMO (International Maritime Organization) always makes valiant effort to increase the visibility of women in the maritime sector and come up with different campaigns and events to do so. Recently, they have launched a new logo as part of its objective to support the United Nations Sustainable Development 5: Achieve gender equality and empower girls and women.

The program focuses on the gender-specific association which is giving high-level technical training to all women in the shipping industry in all developing nations. The main objective of this program is to influence IMO(International Maritime Organization) Member states to come forward and open the doors of their shipping academies to allow women to train in the similar environment in which their male counterparts are being trained.

In academic year 2017-2018, around 361 women was graduated out of total 837 graduates at IMO’s International Maritime Law Institute (IMLI).

IMO has also decided to put their focus completely on the women empowerment in the shipping industry and to prove their point they have set the campaign and theme for the Day of the Seafarer 2019 “I Am On Board with gender equality”. Moreover, they have planned atleast 10 different events under the Maritime Program which includes courses, workshops, conferences and meetings where they will talk about the program.

According to Helen Buni, Principal Programme Assistant, Technical Cooperation Division, IMO, they are inviting the Member States, particularly the regional associations for women in the maritime sector to use the new logo to confirm their support towards global IMO women in the family.

The new logo for the Women in Maritime Program has been designed to promote women empowerment in shipping and it is released under the World Maritime Day theme “Empowering Women in the Maritime Community”. The IMO’s Gender Programme is funded by the IMO’s Technical Cooperation fund with support from a number of donors. IMO always looks forward to find new sources of funding to support their programs.

Reference imo.org