Marine Order 34 (Solid bulk cargoes) 2016
The Australian instrument giving the IMSBC Code and the BLU Code effect in Australian law, with the AMSA approvals, notices and reporting it adds.
Marine Order 34 (Solid bulk cargoes) 2016 is the Australian Maritime Safety Authority instrument that gives the IMSBC Code and the BLU Code effect in Australian law. Made under the Navigation Act 2012, it commenced on 1 January 2017 and replaced the earlier order in the same series.
Beyond adopting the international texts, the order adds Australian machinery on top of them: AMSA approvals for matters the IMSBC Code leaves to a competent authority, requirements for loading and unloading plans, provisions specific to Group A cargoes, a notice of intention to ship a solid bulk cargo, a notice of fumigation, the route for a cargo not listed in appendix 1 of the Code, and marine incident reporting obligations.
The order matters out of proportion to its length because Australia is the largest loading jurisdiction for iron ore and a major one for bauxite and coal, so its interpretation of the Code’s competent authority provisions shapes practice on cargoes loaded there. The full article will cover the order section by section, its current compilation, the AMSA guidance that sits beneath it, and how AMSA has acted on bauxite and nickel ore.