Bangladesh River News

The WORLDWIDE FERRY SAFETY ASSOCIATION (WFSA) has announced that entries will be now accepted for its annual student competition for the design of a safe and affordable ferry. The  upcoming  contest  is  focused  on  designing a  passenger ferry for  the Singapore  Strait between  Indonesia,  Malaysia  and  Singapore. This  narrow  waterway  sees  dense  vessel traffic, with numerous vessel anchorages creating additional challenges for safe navigation. The previous competitions, where a first prize of $5,000 was awarded to the winning student teams were to design: a passenger ferry for the Bangladesh river system; an inter-island  RoPax  for  Papua  New  Guinea;  an  inter-island  RoPax  for  Indonesia;  and  an  urban passenger  ferry  for  Bangkok,  Thailand.

India and Bangladesh have signed the standard operating procedure (SOP) to launch the ‘Agreement on Coastal Shipping’, which is expected bring down the logistic costs of export-import cargo between the two countries. The two sides have also agreed upon the use of vessels of River Sea Vessel category for Indo-Bangladesh coastal shipping. "Once it is operational, the coastal shipping agreement will enable a huge saving in logistic costs of EXIM transport between the two countries," Union Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari said in a statement. "The SOP has been framed as per the terms and conditions of the agreement on coastal Shipping and both India and Bangladesh have agreed to its provisions," Gadkari said after officials from both the sides inked the SOP.

A convergence of forces makes for market opportunities for new safe ferry systems in the developing world. Need, policy, and funding are poised to provide a moment of opportunity. The expanding global economy has resulted in economic and population growth in developing world cities, resulting in horrendous road congestion. In response, governments and businesses have begun planning for intra-urban ferries wherever possible. Ferries in the developing world have a deserved reputation for being unsafe.

Student teams from six maritime universities and schools have submitted proposals for the Second Annual Design Competition for Safe Affordable Ferries sponsored by the Worldwide Ferry Safety Association. A panel of five judges will review the submissions and will announce the winners by early Fall 2014. The top prize is $5,000 with second and third prizes also to be awarded. The student teams were asked to submit a design for a ferry to transport up to 200 passengers and ro-ro cargo between Lae and Kavieng in Papua New Guinea (with several intermediate stops), a distance of 350 nautical miles.