Japan’s shipping giants, Sanko provides new training berths for SA cadets

Another batch of marine navigating and engineering cadets have been offered training berths on ships of the Sanko Steamship Company of Japan.
A spokesman for Cape Town-based Marine Crew Services said this represented another milestone – the company was established five years ago to seek and develop new opportunities for prospective South African seafarers with the world’s shipping fleets. But despite steady progress and some notable achievements, the venture has been hampered by a lack of support from the South African government.
Deanna Collins, MSC director of Crewing & Training said the company was still struggling to get funding to expand the programme more rapidly. She said that so far a number of cadets for whom MCS had secured training berths had completed their three to four year cadetships under the MCS training programme and had successfully obtained their SAMSA Officer of the Watch Certificate of Competency.
“They are now serving as Officers in the Sanko fleet or with other international shipping companies,” said Ms Collins. She says a further number of entrants to the MCS programme over the past two to three years will soon complete the required MCS minimum of fifteen months experiential training at sea on board large Sanko foreign-going vessels. They too should be successful in obtaining their Officer of the Watch Certificate of Competency.
The cadets taking part in the MCS/Sanko programme all completed their studies at either the Durban University of Technology or the Cape Town University of Technology and most of them originate from rural regions in the Northern Cape, KwaZulu Natal, the Eastern and Western Cape.
“The success of this programme can be seen in the increasing number of MCS/Sanko cadets from South Africa who have now completed their sea time and who have recently graduated to the rank of Officer of the Watch and who are now taking on permanent positions within the Sanko fleet as junior officers,” says Ms Collins.
“We now have six cadets who will soon graduate to officers in the Sanko fleet while two are already qualified and serving as officers. A further four will soon qualify.
“While the programme is obviously a major success, we are still struggling to get funding to expand the programme more rapidly.”
Ms Collins says the success to date demonstrates the huge potential to grow the South