World Maritime Day

Without shipping, international trade in the raw materials, energy products and affordable manufactured goods and food that help sustain our civilisation would be virtually impossible and the world would grind to a halt - half of us would starve, the other half would freeze! Intertanko

Following quickly on the heals of "Talk Like a Pirate Day" (mentioned below) September 29, 2005, World Maritime Day is a day dedicated to modern maritime trade and celebrated by the United Nations and the International Maritime Organization and dedicated to International Shipping.

To help commemorate this day the Round Table of international shipping associations has published a Shipping Facts booklet, the Australians used it as both a political statement and a means to call attention to demands of the Seafarers Union, and jobships.com of Belapur is providing a free supplimentary page for seafarers. (If you want a quick peak into today's maritime trade and work environment this is an interesting site. I surfed around it for about 15 minutes. In some ways the business is much different than those I know from working with 19th century papers, and in another way, it's very familiar.)