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– It is just before the ship leaves the dock, without us being on board.
Terje Markussen, President of NITO, Norway’s largest union of engineers and technologists with a bachelor’s, master’s or even higher education, naturally uses maritime terms when describing an unwanted development in the Norwegian shipbuilding industry.
– Be careful!
Two weeks ago, the government presented its climate report. In the report, there are clear expectations that the ferry fleet will be electrified.
“The plan also announces low and zero emission criteria from 2023 when appropriate, for new ferry offers and somewhat later for new high-speed boat offers,” the report states.
It is emphasized several times that the ferry park must be electrified. Then you have to include the Norwegian shipbuilding industry, say NITO and Fellesforbundet.
Fellesforbundet leader Jørn Eggum puts it this way:
– We yelled warning. Stop sponsoring foreign shipyards!
Warns: – 13,000 jobs threatened
Construction brake in Norway
The background of the emergency call is a survey that Fellesforbundet has carried out together with Norsk Industri.
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It shows that fewer and fewer ferries reserved for Norwegian ferry traffic are being built in Norway. Four out of ten ferries are now being built in Norway.
One in ten of the other ferries is built within the EEA, while the rest are built outside of Europe.
The figures also say something about development, because as of 2014, 83 percent of ferries were built in Norway.
– This is not an investment in the maritime industry, it is a reduction of personnel, says Eggum, and continues.
– What can we do so that public support contributes to the much needed activity here in Norway?
Three requirements
Together with NITO, Fellesforbundet presents three clear demands to the government to help the Norwegian shipbuilding industry.
1. A unit of experts with high competence in public tenders must be established, on which municipal and municipal buyers can rely.
2. The Government should study Norway’s room for maneuver, especially vis-à-vis non-EEA countries.
3. The strength of Norwegian industry should be emphasized in the design of tenders and the award of contracts. Criteria for working conditions and HSE should be part of the tender.
– Here, Norway is clearly ahead of everyone else. The agreed salary and working conditions and HSE may be part of the bidding conditions, but this is not the case today. There may be a reason that this is not the case, but here the Storting has its own opportunity to facilitate the maritime sector. They can use the criteria to inform county townships and municipalities when they make their purchases.
– It’s about using Norwegian shipyards. Don’t put them at a disadvantage, but make strict demands, the toughest and toughest demands. We will be able to live with that, says Eggum.
SV billion for shipyards
– The competition disappears
NITO says that Norwegian money is expected to benefit Norwegian business and industry, and urges the government to use whatever leeway they have.
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– We must make demands. We must have requirements for both the team, HSE and the trainees. These are things we need to clarify so that we use the EEA rules for what they are worth and see if there is an opportunity to position the Norwegian shipbuilding industry, says Markussen.
– What we lose now we will not get back. If we go to bed and say goodbye, we can’t just start over. This is not ready to use, it is cool.
Eggum says it even more clearly:
– If we do not understand that time is critical, the industry will disappear in the long term. The competition disappears. Competition is not something you can turn on and off, it gets better the more you use it.
Requires shorter working hours
– Sponsor abroad
It is the fear that jobs will disappear and that the shipbuilding industry will end up with serious backlogs that makes NITO and Fellesforbundet now present a joint proposal:
“Now, most of them do those assignments abroad. At the forefront, we sponsor professional communities in other countries to be even better at green transportation, while here at home we lose competition.”
The two organizations fear that the industry will expire if politicians do not help them.
– Something happened in 2015. Then they started taking the business out. Some of the construction has been pulled, but Norwegian subcontractors have been involved, says Markussen, who notes that it is being built in Poland, Turkey and some in Asia.
– Now these other nations are trying to be self-sufficient. First we lose the shipyards, then we lose subcontractors. It is going in the wrong direction.
– It is critical and important that the Storting and the government understand that this is serious, says Eggum.
– Don’t let us push
– Must work harder
Climate and Environment Minister Sveinung Rotevatn tells Børsen that they see value creation in the eco-maritime sector that is higher than in many other industries.
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– But we must constantly strive to ensure that more of this value creation stays here in Norway. Like NITO and Fellesforbundet, I see a number of challenges here, and that is precisely the reason why I have taken the initiative of a new project that will look at how we can increase the export potential in Norwegian green maritime technology. Including a strengthening of the Norwegian domestic market, says Rotevatn.
He notes that the government is investing heavily in green shipping precisely because this market has great potential for Norwegian industry, technology and jobs.
– And we have taken the lead. It is, for example, the Norwegian electrification market in the ferry industry that led Corvus Energy to establish a battery factory in Bergen. But we must constantly work to achieve greater value creation in Norway, I fully agree with that, says Rotevatn.
