>Press Releases Home > Publications and press releases > Press Releases Classification societies authorized to provide ship safety code services The Director of Marine, Mr Tsui Shung-yiu, today (Wednesday) signed agreements with representatives from seven classification societies to authorize them to carry out the International Safety Management (ISM) Code verification and certification services for Hong Kong registered ships. The seven classification societies are American Bureau of Shipping, Bureau Veritas, China Classification Society, Det Norske Veritas, Germanischer Lloyd, Lloyd's Register of Shipping and Nippon Kaiji Kyokai. A Marine Department spokesman reminded owners, operators, agents and masters of ships that the ISM Code would be implemented in Hong Kong starting next month. "It applies to passenger ships, including passenger-carrying high-speed craft regardless of gross tonnage, and all oil tankers, chemical tankers, gas carriers, bulk carriers and cargo carrying high-speed craft of 500 gross tonnage and over," he said. With effect from July 1, each incoming ship of the above categories, except China ships trading only on Special Domestic Voyages between Hong Kong and the Mainland, has to declare on the Pre-arrival Notification to the Vessel Traffic Centre whether or not it is in possession of a certified copy of the Document of Compliance (DOC) in respect of the operating company and the Safety Management Certificate (SMC) in respect of the ship issued by the relevant administrations or their recognised organisations. When reporting the arrival and departure of the vessel, the DOC and SMC have to be produced in addition to the trading certificates at the Port Formalities Office. "Ships not holding the ISM certificates are subject to Port State Control (PSC) inspections and may be denied of granting port clearance permits," the spokesman said. "Charges will be levied by the Marine Department for PSC inspections," he added. Ships not complying with ISM certification requirements may be detained under the PSC scheme. "On the first instance, such ships may be allowed to sail provided that there is no other detainable deficiencies and the flag administration confirms that necessary action is being taken to implement the ISM certification requirements," the spokesman said. "Such ships will not be allowed to enter Hong Kong waters again until they possess the ISM certificates," he stressed. Wednesday, 10 June 1998
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