Training programme addresses shortage of surveyors

With its parent company Santam having established a strong presence in Namibia over many years, Associated Marine rates the country as its top market in Africa. “Through our Santam connection we’ve built up strong relationships with brokers in the whole of Namibia, and any marine business referred to them comes back to us,” says chief operating officer Mike Brews. “We’re involved in cargo moving in and out of Namibia as well as on the route between South Africa and Namibia.” It’s a reasonably profitable market, says Brews, although there are a fair number of claims arising from accidents and the like – even though crime is less endemic than on the SA-Zimbabwe route, for example. One of the biggest problems, in his view, is the limited number of available surveyors with marine and transit experience who can assess the cargo and arrange for salvage in the case of a claim. “That means we can’t minimise our losses as readily as we’d like to – particularly when it comes to an accident.” And since the country’s strict labour laws prohibit the import of staff without the appropriate work permits, the company is forced to make do with what’s available. “Elsewhere in Africa we use a Lloyds surveyor and they have a network of people they deal with. But because we’ve been in Namibia so long we tend to appoint our own surveyors directly.” To mitigate the problem, Associated Marine has embarked on a training programme between its staff and their Santam counterparts as well as the brokers with whom they deal. The idea is to share knowledge of the processes that need to be followed in case of a loss and how to minimise those losses. Another challenge is the issue of documentation, says Brews. “A lot of people in Namibia do business on a handshake because it’s such a small and close-knit market and everyone trusts each other. From our perspective we need documentation to put together a full scenario of what happened in the claim – and often it’s not available. “This once again comes back to education of brokers and clients,” says Brews, “explaining that a claim will not be paid if stipulated documentation is not available.” For the year ahead the focus is on growth. “There’s a drive this year to grow Namibia along with the rest of Africa,” says Brews, who doesn’t rule out the possibility of opening further own offices on the continent in the near future.