Standards of Container Packing Must Be Improved

It is no surprise that the correct packing of containers is high on the agenda for industry bodies, regulators and insurers, as the consequences of unsafe and badly secured cargo are serious. In fact, of all freight transport insurer TT Club’s claims, some 65 percent feature cargo loss or damage and of these over one-third result from poor packing. Higher levels of training to maintain and improve the expertise of those employed by shippers, consolidators, warehouses and depots to pack containers is now a primary objective of a number of current industry initiatives.

It is timely therefore that TT Club and Exis Technologies have come together to develop CTUpack e-learning, an online training tool for those involved in the loading and unloading of containers or Cargo Transport Units. By exhibiting at TOC Europe in Rotterdam (June 25-27), both organizations hope to further focus industry attention on the significant and dangerous implications of bad packing and the training required to address the problem.

Designed and produced by Exis Technologies on the initiative of TT Club, and with its financial investment, the CTUpack e-learning course is aligned with IMO/ILO/UN ECE* guidelines for packing containers. Beginning with the foundation course, which will be launched later this year, it will comprise modules that include topics such as cargo or transport and elements that are the equivalent of lessons, covering areas like forces and stresses.

In the future, the course will evolve to reflect developments and updates to the ILO guidelines and there is a capacity for additional modules to incorporate cargo specific and more advanced training elements.

The CTUpack e-learning foundation course will be available for the web or intranet, in both cases providing administrator functions for setting up and monitoring students’ records. There will also be a SCORM** compliant version for use within standard learning management systems.

Peregrine Storrs-Fox, TT Club’s Risk Management Director, commented “CTUpack e-learning follows the well established IMDG Code e-learning training course from Exis, which is also sponsored by TT Club. Both courses are relevant to the risk management approach that the Club has always fostered within the global freight transport community. As in other operational sectors of the industry, training is clearly the number one loss prevention measure and, if adopted as a core feature of an operator’s culture, can greatly reduce the number of claims that we see each year.”


*International Labor Organization/International Maritime Organization/United Nations Economic Commission for Europe

**The internationally recognized collection of standards and specifications for web-based e-learning