MPA sets up Crew Facilitation Centre, fund for safe crew change

The self-contained facility will house crew for up to 48 hours prior to boarding.

The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA), with the support of PSA Singapore, will set up a Crew Facilitation Centre (CFC) in its existing floating accommodation at the Tangjong Pagar Terminal, according to a press release. This is part of its enhanced measures for safe port operations.

The CFC is a self-contained facility with an onsite medical centre, testing, and holding facilities. It will house crew for up to 48 hours prior to boarding their ships, if required, when their ship and flight schedule do not match, according to the MPA.

Sign-off crew will proceed to depart Singapore or stay at existing designated holding facilities Seacare Hotel or accommodation vessel “POSH Bawean” for up to 48 hours, and be strictly segregated from the community, they added.

Further the MPA, along with the Singapore Shipping Association, Singapore Maritime Officers' Union, and Singapore Organisation of Seamen, will establish a $1m Singapore Shipping Tripartite Alliance Resilience (SG-STAR) fund to work with stakeholders in seafaring nations on ‘concrete’ solutions for safe crew changes. 

These include best practices for crew holding facilities and establishing PCR testing centres.

The MPA has also outlined a new crew change procedure in line with the risk managed approach taken by the Multi-Ministry Taskforce. Under the new guidelines, new members who has stayed at least 14 days from specific low-risk countries or regions to sign-on to ships in Singapore will either no longer be required to serve a stay-at-home isolation in the originating country or region, only serve a shorter isolation of seven days prior to departure for Singapore.

However, crew members from other countries or regions will continue to serve an isolation period of 14 days prior to departure.

Ship owners, managers and agents are required to ensure that the pre-departure COVID-19 Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) tests are carried out at government-approved or ISO-accredited testing facilities.