PROCEDURE FOR ADOPTING A CONVENTION

                                                           Procedure for adopting a convention:

                  This is the port of the process with which IMO as an organization is most closely involved. IMO has six main bodies concerned with the adoption or implementation & conventions. The Assembly and council are main organs, and the committees involved are the maritime safety committee, Marine environment protection committee legal committee and the facilitation committee. Developments in shipping and other related industries are discussed by member states in these bodies and the need for a new convention or amendments to existing conventions can be raised in any of them. Normally the suggestion is first made in one of the committees, since these meet more frequently than the main organs. If agreement is reached in the committee, the proposal goes to the council and, as necessary, to the Assembly. If the Assembly or the council as the case may be gives the authorization to proceed with the work, the committee concerned considers the mater in greater detail and ultimately draws up a draft instrument. The draft convention, which is agreed upon is, reported to the council and assembly with a recommendation that a conference be convened to consider the draft for formal adoption. Invitations to attend such a conference are sent to all member state of IMO. Before the conference opens, the draft convention is circulated to the invited Govts. and organizations for their comments. The draft convention, together with the comments thereon from Govts and interested organizations is the closely examined by the conference and necessary changes are made in order to produce a draft acceptable to all or the majority of the Govt. present. The convention this agreed upon is then adopted by the conference and deposited with the secretary-General who rends copies to Govts. The convention is opened for signature by states, usually for a period of 12 months. Signatories may ratify or accept the convention while non-signatories may accede. The drafting and adoption of a convention in IMO can take several years to complete although in some cases, where a quick response is required to deal with an emergency situation, Govts. have been willing to accelerate this process considerably.

                  Before the convention comes into force that is, before it becomes binding upon govt., which have ratified it, it has to be accepted formally by individual Governments.

                  Accepting a convention does not merely involve the deposit of a formal instrument. A Govts. acceptance of a convention necessarily place on it the obligation to take the measures required by the convention. Often national law has to be enacted or changed to enforce the provisions of the convention. Adequate notice must be given to ship owners, ship builders and other interested parties so they make, take account of the provisions of the Convention in their future acts and plans. At present IMO conventions enter into force within an average of five years after adoption.

                  Tacit acceptance Procedure: Technology and Techniques in the shipping industry change very rapidly. As a result, not only are new conventions required but existing ones to be kept up to date.

                  IMO had no authority to adopt let alone amend conventions. Its mandate allowed it only to "Provide for the drafting of conventions, agreements or other instruments and to recommend those to governments and to Inter governmental organizations and to convince such conferences as may be necessary." IMO convention specifically stated that IMO's functions were to be "consultative and advisory." the organization could arrange a conference but it was up to the conference to decide whether the convention under discussion should or should not be adopted and to decide how it should be amended. Most of IMO conventions could only be updated by means of "classical" (passive) amendment procedure. The number member states of IMO were rising all the time as new countries emerged and began to develop their shipping activities. As the number of parties rose, so did the total required to amend the convention. The problem was made worse by the fact that governments took for longer to accept amendments than they did to ratify the parent convention. The amendments adopted to the 1960 SOLAS convention in 1966, 1967, 1968 and 1969 had failed to enter into force till 1971. It was felt that unless the International maritime community was sufficiently responsive to these charged circumstances states will once again revert to the practice of unilaterally deciding what standards to apply to their owners shipping and to foreign flag shipping visiting their ports. Studies were made on alternative amendment procedures.

                  The main reason why amendments took so long to enter into force was the time taken to gain acceptance by 2/3 of contracting Governments. One way of reducing this period would be by "specifying a date of entry into force after adoption by the Assembly, unless the date of amendment is explicitly rejected by certain number or contracting Govts."  The body which adopts the amendments at the same time fixes a time period within which contracting parties will have the opportunity to notify either their acceptance or their rejection of the amendment, or to remain silent on the subject. In case of silence the amendment is considered to have been accepted by the party. This is known as the "tacit" or "passive" acceptance procedure.

                  Convention: is a set of rules which are adopted by all countries and comes into force on agreed date. Any changes in above conventions after date of enforcement are done through various amendments.

                  Rule: is a governing authority.

                  Regulation: is a generally accepted condition or course of action.

                  Protocol: If a majority of changes are required is a convention which has been adopted but not in force, then those are incorporated in the convention and it is called PROTOCOL.

                  e.g.: the Marpol Convention 1973 has also been amended by means of protocols. The 1978 marpol protocol made major changes to Marpol.

                  It also absorbed the parent convention and ensured that the combined Convention / Protocol instrument (called Marpol 73/78) would enter into force at an earlier date then the present convention would have done alone (Marpol 73/78 come into force on 2nd Oct 1983).