Our European partners

The Shortsea Promotion Centres

The establishment of the Shortsea Promotion Centres (SPCs) at a European level, stemmed from the need indicated in the Communication of the Commission of 1999, already recommended by the Maritime Institute Forum (MIF) in 1995, to change the incorrect and negatively perceived image of the maritime transport industry that was obstructing its potential future development.

The first promotion office was established in Holland in 1997, followed by Belgium, France, and then Finland.In 2000, all the offices that currently exist were established.

Right from the start, it was clear that the promotion of information within a single country would not have been sufficient and that for a more effective way of developing Short Sea Shipping (SSS), there needed to be a way of acting collectively, as one unit.In addition, it was also clear that there had be a ‘level playing field’ on a European level.

After there was a sufficient number of countries with SSS promotion offices, the process of making the network a reality was started although some offices have different structures and objectives, all have in common the desire to promote SSS, in the broad sense of the term, which allows a very practical approach to the activities of the network.

The first preliminary meeting of the ESN was held in Anversa, on December 1^st, 2000. This was followed by the first official meeting (8^th March 2001) that the Dutch SPC organised near their office in Rhoon (Holland), directly after a meeting organised by the EC on March 7^th , 2001. The second official meeting was held on June 28^th in Naples, which was organised by the Italian SPC.

The meetings were helpful to lay down the bases of the co-operation (with some decisions taken):

• Although the centres will maintain their names of the SPC in their original language, they will all have a common name in English: Shortsea Promotion Centre (SPC) followed by the name of the country in English, e.g. Shortsea Promotion Centre – Italy
• The centres will register a web site with the following domain name: www.shortsea.extention of the county, e.g. www.shortsea.it (Italy), www.shortsea.nl (Netherlands), or www.shortsea.fr (France);
• Collectively, the centres will register the domain of the common web site, www.shortsea.info which will simply become, www.shortsea.eu when the extension is available;
• The network will have the name European Shortsea Network (ESN), with its own logo, even though the legal structure of the ESN is not separate from the 14+ individual offices.

Within the network, the Italian SPC is responsible for the administration and development of the CIRCA intra-net site, which was made available to the ESN by the EC.

In the future, the number of countries within the network will increase, with the inclusion of the Eastern European countries (Poland has already set up a promotion centre and a web site: www.shortsea.pl), while Italy has been approaching and promoting SSS to the countries that border the Mediterranean.These countries can turn to Italy – the natural logistical platform of the Mediterranean – for advise as suggested by the EC because of the establishment of a free trade zone in 2010.The Italian promotion centre is willing to provide information and practical advice to whichever country wants more information regarding SSS.