Around the world and at all levels, effective methods of ensuring safety at sea are based on the following three lines:
Prevention (the safest element and the most effective in relation to its cost): appropriate equipment, training, experience, information, and discernment l to avoid being in danger.
Self-help survival and rescue: the equipment, training, and attitudes necessary to survive and carry out self-rescue operations when the going gets tough.
Search and Rescue (SAR) (the most expensive and least efficient of the three levels): Warning, search and rescue systems, which are called in if the first two lines of defense have failed.
The importance of good training in reducing the loss of life, through accident prevention and increased probability of survival, as well as in reducing SAR costs, cannot be over-emphasized. The main obstacles to good training are the costs involved and the lack of mandatory requirements. In addition, institutions providing security training are often met with distrust and resistance from the industrial sector; However, it has been found in practice that these difficulties can be overcome if it appears that the gwo training providers are useful and have specialized knowledge not only in safety but also in fisheries,
Community involvement
Even if all relevant international conventions were broadened to include fisheries, ratified by a sufficient number of countries, and implemented and transformed into laws and regulations at the country level, it would not be possible to ensure a safe environment. safe work without the participation of communities. Measures aimed at improving safety can only be truly effective if there is a real motivation to apply them. Building and maintaining a culture of safety is an ongoing task that requires the participation of fishermen and their families, boat owners, legislators, and the community at large. In many countries, groups of
On commercial and fishing vessels, the danger has always been part of the working environment and has apparently been accepted as such. Due to the rapid expansion of fleets to the XIX th and XX the centuries, and as ships ventured farther into uncharted waters, seafaring disasters have multiplied, drawing public attention to this problem. Gradually, therefore, concerted efforts were made to remedy this situation: lighthouses were erected, coastal water maps were improved, ports were constructed and organized search and rescue systems were created. Emergency posts, staffed by volunteer coast guards and containing a boat and the equipment necessary to come to the aid of ships in danger, have been set up in strategic locations.
At the beginning of the 20th century, it was rare to find safety equipment onboard ships. Even aboard an ocean liner like the SS Titanic, life rafts and boats were only provided for a portion of the passengers. It was following the sinking of the Titanic, which continues to generate public interest around the world, that the first international treaty to improve safety at sea, the SOLAS Convention, was born. At the national level, it also had the effect of reinforcing the importance of the voluntary organizations that had been created in the coastal areas, often supported by the widows and mothers of fishermen and by other women in the communities. Their aim was to promote a culture of safety, to raise the necessary funds.
These voluntary organizations have played a crucial role in promoting safety among the fishing communities of the North Atlantic. In recent years, one of their main tasks in many communities has been to prepare systematically and deliver safety training courses for fishermen.
Reluctance to attend safety training courses
Despite dynamic activities, well organized and widely encouraged by the organizers, the reluctance of fishermen to attend safety gwo courses is a matter of serious concern.
Fishermen often seem not to be aware of the risks inherent in their profession or not to want to admit their existence. In addition to the many fragmentary observations, scientific studies show that fishermen tend to take risks, some of them even reporting that they are more often the victims of a fatal accident on land than people carrying out another profession. In a Canadian study, the "hierarchy of concerns" established by inshore fishermen shows that they are primarily concerned about the depletion of fish stocks and the potential loss of work, etc. Then come other concerns at the end like the concern or fear of being injured during their work.
With this attitude, coupled with their reluctance to devote some of their precious time ashore to training and to accept a potential loss of income while they are in class, it is difficult, if not it is pointless to offer optional safety training to fishermen. It is interesting to note that at the international conference on safety and working conditions on board fishing vessels, held in Rimouski (Canada) in 1989, speakers from different regions of the world admitted that Because of the dumbness of fishermen, it would be pointless to offer them optional safety training courses.