European Maritime Safety Agency

Background

The European Commission's proposal updates EMSA's mandate to better reflect the growing role the Agency plays in many maritime transport areas: safety, pollution prevention and environmental protection, climate action, security, surveillance and crisis management, and digitalisation – including the new safety and sustainability tasks stemming from this legislative package.

For example, the Commission and the Member States will rely on EMSA's support when implementing the FuelEU Maritime Regulation and extending the EU emissions trading system to maritime transport.

The Agency will also continue assisting the Commission and the Member States with maritime surveillance, cybersecurity resilience and crisis preparedness and will play a significant role in simplifying reporting between Member States through IT tools, while continuing offering training and capacity building for national administrations.

Key points

• The Committee welcomes the proposal to expand the activities of EMSA; however, it has serious doubts as to whether EMSA has the human and financial resources to perform these additional activities properly. The proposed increase in EMSA's resources is insufficient given the extent of the proposed increase in the Agency's tasks and the scale of the EU's ambitions for maritime policy.
• The Committee believes that the Agency could play a substantial role in supporting the training of Port State Control inspectors and officials of the Flag State Administrations to conduct targeted inspections as regards the implementation of seafarers' rights and working and living conditions on board ships.
• The Committee would like to see a more active and substantial participation and contribution by the social partners. This will improve EMSA's relations with external stakeholders and increase the visibility and transparency of the Agency's activities.

Additional information

Section: Transport, Energy, Infrastructure and the Information Society (TEN)

Opinion number: TEN/810

Opinion type: Mandatory

Referral: COM(2023) 269 final 2023/0163 COD

Rapporteur: Kaia Vask (Workers - Group II / Estonia)

Date of adoption by section: 6 September 2023

Result of the vote: 31 in favour, 0 against, 0 abstentions

Date of adoption in plenary: 20-21 September 2023

Result of the vote: 222 in favour, 0 against, 2 abstentions

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