At the last meeting, the Government of Montenegro adopted the Regulation on the amendment of the Regulation on the amount of fees for the use of navigation safety facilities on maritime routes, which enabled a drastic reduction of that fee for ships that would come to Montenegro for the purpose of being put into service.
This primarily applies to large passenger ships - cruise ships, because the cruise industry is one of the most affected economic sectors in the world due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic has had a devastating effect on the global cruise industry and almost the entire fleet of passenger ships for tourist cruises has been put out of service, so companies are looking for places where they can put their ships on which the so-called skeleton crew (minimum number of crew members required for the safe navigation of the ship) until the end of the crisis, tie or anchor and thus put in preparation.
In this, Montenegro also sees its chance to earn at least partially something from nautical tourism, especially during the coming winter months, so the Government, on the initiative of the Maritime Safety and Port Management Authority, last week amended and supplemented the Decree on the amount of compensation for the use of navigation safety facilities on maritime routes (the so-called light duty). An additional new article was introduced into it, which foresees a drastic reduction of that fee for vessels in preparation (regardless of their type or size) to the amount of only 0,20 euros per net ton of such a vessel. This fee will be charged once, regardless of the time period of detention of the unloaded ship in Montenegrin waters.
We stipulate that if such a ship, while staying in Montenegro, stops unloading and starts commercial operations, it must immediately start paying the full fee for the light duty, which amounts to 0,6 euros per net ton for the month, that is, 2 euros per net ton of the ship for an annual fee.
"Since the current practice and application of the current Regulation has shown the need and interest for navigation of vessels for the purpose of negotiation in the territorial waters of Montenegro, and that the Regulation on the amount of compensation for the use of navigation safety facilities on waterways and the Regulation on the amendment of the Regulation on the amount of compensation for the use of navigation safety facilities on waterways, the amount of compensation for all types of vessels under consideration is not prescribed (a vessel that does not carry out commercial operations, that is not under load, i.e. it is not waiting for loading or unloading of cargo, nor is it undergoing overhaul or necessary repairs along the operational coast) the adopted Regulation defines the compensation for this type of vessels." - the Government explained.
Since they received requests from large foreign cruise companies for longer accommodation of some of their ships in our ports, in the Directorate of Maritime Safety and Port Management of Montenegro, they took a series of steps to enable port operators to dock in them, if they find a commercial interest for it. , can accommodate such cruisers. Back in May, an action plan was defined and a protocol was developed for the eventual reception of unloaded cruisers under strict supervision and in compliance with all valid NKT measures. In this way, the operators of the port, as well as a number of other economic entities, would at least earn something, by charging for the ship's mooring, services for supplying water, fuel, food and other necessities, by charging the so-called lighting and other things.
For the possible reception of cruisers that are in the so-called lay up status, there are significant unused capacities, primarily in the shipyard port of Bijela, where at least 6 to 8 large cruise ships can be moored at the same time, but also in Zelenica, Risno, Bar...
Depending on whether in the so-called hot or prologned lay up status (deployed for a shorter or longer term), i.e. depending on how many crew members are kept on board, operating costs for the owner of just one laid-up large cruiser range from 1 to 3 million dollars per month. Of this, the crew's wages are the biggest cost, but the rest of the allocations, which end up in the pockets of the port operator, the economy and indirectly, the budgets of the countries where the ship is being handled, are not negligible either. Currently, a large part of the world's cruise fleet is under preparation, and only some of these ships make a short trip here and there with very strict measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
"VIKING SEA" CAME ASIDE TO REPLACE PART OF THE CREW
On Monday evening, the cruise ship "Viking Sea" of the Norwegian-American company Viking Cruises made a short stop in Boka Kotorska.
On her way from Belfast, Northern Ireland, where she was in preparation for a few months, to Trieste, Italy, this 47.850-ton cruiser briefly sailed into Boka, where she anchored in front of Tivat. The reason for his arrival was the replacement of part of the crew, i.e. the boarding of 15 sailors on the "Viking Sea" through the border crossing in the Porto Montenegro marina, from where they were connected to the ship docked in the bay by one of the passenger tenders of the "Viking Sea" itself.
This was the first case since the beginning of the coronavirus epidemic in Montenegro in March of this year, that a foreign cruiser changed part of the crew in our waters. Due to the corona virus, most of the approximately 560 expected arrivals of cruise ships in the Port of Kotor in 2020 have been cancelled, and from mid-March until now, the smaller French cruise ship "Le Champlain" of 9.900 tons has sailed in Bok only on a couple of occasions, which, however, did not stay , he would just make a circle through the bay to Kotor and immediately continue his journey.
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