Consultation meeting on new shipping schedule

The management of Malta Motorways of the Seas, through the co-operation and co-ordination of the Malta Federation of Industry, held a consultation meeting with FOI members wishing to discuss the proposed new sailing schedule. This followed meetings the company held with FOI officials, trailer operators, and the Minister of Transport.

The schedule proposed the introduction of more sailings between Malta and Italy, with the aim of reducing any problems being encountered by importers and exporters based in Malta that utilise these services.

The main objective of this consultation meeting, held at the FOI on May 29, was to enable FOI members to voice any concerns or queries they had to senior officials of Malta Motorways of the Sea Ltd, namely Ernest Sullivan and Joe Bugeja.

Among the points raised were aspects relating to the delays of shipment under the current schedule; cargo releases from Civitavecchia on Sundays; requests for later sailings on Thursday and Friday; limitations of groupage services; security concerns at Genoa and Civitavecchia ports; and the possible rerouting of some of the scheduled vessels.

As was agreed during this meeting, Mr Sullivan and Mr Bugeja promised to discuss and study each of the points raised, possibly involving senior officials from the Grimaldi Group and, early last week, the FOI distributed their feedback to all the FOI participants on a number of positive developments.