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Side-scan sonar (SSS) is now a prevalent instrument for large-scale seafloor topography measurements, deployable on an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) to execute fully automated underwater acoustic scanning imaging along a predetermined trajectory. However, SSS images often suffer from speckle noise caused by mutual interference between echoes, and limited AUV computational resources further hinder noise suppression. Existing approaches for SSS image processing and speckle noise reduction rely heavily on complex network structures and fail to combine the benefits of deep learning and domain knowledge. To address the problem, RepDNet, a novel and effective despeckling convolutional neural network is proposed. RepDNet introduces two re-parameterized blocks: the Pixel Smoothing Block (PSB) and Edge Enhancement Block (EEB), preserving edge information while attenuating speckle noise. During training, PSB and EEB manifest as double-layered multi-branch structures, integrating first-order and second-order derivatives and smoothing functions. During inference, the branches are re-parameterized into a 3 × 3 convolution, enabling efficient inference without sacrificing accuracy. RepDNet comprises three computational operations: 3 × 3 convolution, element-wise summation and Rectified Linear Unit activation. Evaluations on benchmark datasets, a real SSS dataset and Data collected at Lake Mulan aestablish RepDNet as a well-balanced network, meeting the AUV computational constraints in terms of performance and latency.

COVID-19 pandemic clearly demonstrates that seafarers are essential for sustaining world shipping services and global supply chain. Understanding the characteristics of supply and demand in seafarer market will be a solution for the bottleneck issues of seafarer change and shipping services. This paper explores the supply and demand of seafarer market in Korea and evaluates the effects of COVID-19 on both supply and demand sides of Korean seafarers by adopting regression models with panel data for the supply and time series data for the demand. First, this paper finds that the effects of COVID-19 are negative in the demand of Korean seafarer market even with the wider increase of tonnage of the Korean flagged ships in 2020. The demand shock seems to be resulted by the traveling restriction and stricter immigration measures to travellers after the announcement of COVID-19 pandemic. Second, supply in the regression models of panel data is affected negatively after declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic may trigger the hesitation of seafaring due to the travelling restriction and bottlenecks from seafarer changes onboard. Besides these findings, the correlation coefficients between the number of Korean seafarers of merchant ships and merchant fleet illustrate a diverse relationship between the two. The expansion of Korean ocean-going fleet is accompanied by the decrease of Korean seafarers on the Korean flag. The employment of foreign seafarers since 1992 has resulted in the continual decrease of ratings employment in the Korean flagged ships. The inflow of foreign deck officers in the Korean flagged ships after 2005 could lessen the officer deficiency caused by high separation rate of Korean deck officers. This inflow implies that seafarer market in a country not only affects global seafarer market in the world through the changes of seafarer supply and demand in the country, but is affected by the global market. The dual markets of Korean seafarers in ocean-going and coastal shipping present the following phenomena: severe aging of seafarers in coastal shipping and wider difference in welfare level of seafarers between the two. Further research on wage and career advancement of Korean seafarers would widen and deepen our understanding on seafarer market both for Korea and the rest of the world.

•This paper extends the EVAMIX (EVAluation of MIXed Data) method.•These extensions are fuzzy extension, group decision and expert prioritization.•Four criteria and three alternatives are determined for gas transportation industry.•Ship selection is conducted as an empirical study.•The ranking result reflects the recent oversupply of LNG carriers.

More frequent cruisers prefer attractive cruising destinations, excellent geographical locations, diversified oriental cultures, local wildlife, rich tourism resource and exotic experiences in Asia for western travellers. Cruising in the Asian regions has considered as a potential growth in the transport and tourism industry. In this paper, we aim to provide suggestions to industrial practitioners on the development of the cruise port in Asia and identify the key elements of a regional leading cruise hub as desired by different users. Nevertheless, the majority of cruising-related studies were focused on tourism management in the North American and European regions. Relevant cruising studies on maritime transport management in the Asian region are under-researched. In doing so, we newly propose the CRUISE PORT framework by illustrating four representative countries in Asia (South Korea, Japan, Vietnam and Singapore) to look for common characteristics and unique features of cruise ship market in the Asian region. In order to give the valuable information and provide insight into the framework, we carried out semi-structured, in-depth interviews with different practitioners involved in the cruise industry. Through the framework, it fosters the industrial practitioners to implement cruise port strategies, cruise lines strategies and local government planning for the cruise destinations.

Purpose: Cruise tourism is the fastest-growing segment of the shipping and port industry. This study aims to develop an analytic model to assess the key criteria and sub-criteria influencing four cruise port's development in Taiwan. Design/methodology/approach: Based on the literature review, four criteria and 13 sub-criteria are developed and analysed by fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP). Four cruise ports include Kaohsiung, Keelung, Taichung and Hualien ports. The 26 relevant field experts (including cruise operators, governmental officials and academics) were invited to provide information for assessing the sub-criteria in the model. Findings: The results indicate that port infrastructure and facilities are the most important criterion, followed by port-city development plans, port geography and climate and port regulations and services. In addition, the three most important sub-criteria overall are the onshore tourism programme, the city’s historical and cultural features and the green port hinterland transport system. Also, Keelung port is ranked as the best port, followed by Kaohsiung, Taichung and Hualien. Originality/value: As Asia is an important cruise market in the world (ranked as third) and passenger number in Taiwan has achieved the top two in Asia, denoting Taiwan is a good market to develop an evaluation model of cruise ports. The findings present a holistic picture of the relative importance of the various criteria associated with cruise port development and raise issues related to cruise port marketing and the economic and environmental sustainability of ports and their hinterlands.

Purpose: This study aims to analyse the observation that the economics of many countries have boomed after the input of substantial investments into physical and social infrastructures. Design/methodology/approach: A structural equation model is formulated to examine the effect of transportation infrastructure on the relationship between institutions and gross domestic product per capita (GDPPC). This study further differentiates between developed and developing economies. Findings: The study identifies the different roles of transportation infrastructure in mediating the relationship between institutions and average income in these two types of economy. Institutions and transportation infrastructure positively influence GDPPC, whereas institutions positively influence transportation infrastructure. In addition, the results found indirect influence of institutions on GDPPC via transportation infrastructure. Originality/value: This study provides new insights into international business studies based on institutional theory and factor-mobility theory.

Purpose: This study aims to investigate the efficiency changes of 23 major Asian container ports for the period from 2000 to 2007. In addition to assess the general trend, it also attempts to decompose the overall efficiency change into technological efficiency change, technical efficiency change and scale efficiency change to help port authorities to devise operational strategies. Design/methodology/approach: The Malmquist index method is used, which is derived from data envelopment analysis. In this model, technological improvement comes from using state-of-the-art technologies, technical improvement is from rationalizing of port inputs and scale efficiency is from adjustment of port operational scales. Findings: On average, the investigated ports have improved their efficiencies by 14.3 per cent. Such efficiency gains can be attributed to a 41 per cent increase in pure technical efficiency, a 47.5 per cent increase in scale efficiency and a 30.5 per cent decrease in technological efficiency. The scale efficiency contributes the most to the overall efficiency improvement, while technical and technological effects seem to have less impact. The fact that technological efficiency has little variance seems to suggest that this source of efficiency gain may not bring substantial competitive advantage. Research limitations/implications: The sample period is 2000-2007, so the impact from the Asian financial crisis or the economic downturn was not covered. Also, the port throughputs data do not separate shipment and transhipment. Originality/value: This study provides valuable suggestions to improve efficiency for container ports along the “Maritime Silk Road.”

Purpose: The role of clusters in the development and growth of local and national economies has been extensively studied and discussed in global literature. Different methodologies are used for analysing the impact these have in national and regional economies, such as the input–output (IO) and gravity models. This paper aims to detail the methodologies present in the literature and propose a new robust theoretical framework, which facilitates the evaluation and comparison among maritime clusters in terms of attractiveness assisting stakeholders to devise strategies, which will attract companies. Design/methodology/approach: An index is created composed of five key categories, namely, infrastructure, financing, governance, manpower and institution/legislation. For the analysis of the index, multi-attribute utility theory (MAUT) is used as a tool to evaluate the importance and performance of the different attributes using both quantitative and qualitative criteria. The methodology has been tested via the use the Piraeus maritime cluster. Findings: The framework has been tested on its robustness and friendliness to the user providing useful insights to the stakeholders. Among the results has been the importance of the finance, manpower and infrastructure attributes, which appear to promote the cluster’s attractiveness. In addition, legislation and institutional partnerships, along with Government support, need to take place improve the performance of the cluster. Research limitations/implications: A key limitation is the fact that the methodology has been tested in a single case. Applying the methodological framework in a wider sample of clusters will significantly improve the present work. Originality/value: The proposed model takes further existing research in the field via adopting the philosophy of the World Bank’s Logistics Performance Index. Among the benefits of the proposed index is that it offers the flexibility and robustness to compare among different maritime clusters globally and can be readily used as a benchmarking policy tool at national, regional and global levels at any given point in time and attribute dimension.

Concerns have been raised around pilotage in Korea due to a rise in marine accidents in the 2010s. Since the late 2000s, a debate has been sparked on the most suitable age of retirement for Korean pilots. The debate has focused on the extension of retirement age of pilots from 65 to 68 and whether this will affect the probability of marine accidents. Therefore, it is crucial to calculate the probability of marine accidents in relation to different age groups of pilots. After collecting the data of marine accidents caused by pilot's negligence, the study suggests two measurements of probability of marine accidents during pilotage: on the basis of the number of pilotage services and the hours of pilotage services. The analysis finds that age is not the exclusive cause of pilotage marine accidents by the age group over 65.

Purpose: This paper aims to forecast inbound and outbound container throughput for Bangkok Port to 2041 and uses the results to inform the future planning and management of the port’s container terminal. Design/methodology/approach: The data used cover a period of 16 years (192 months of observations). Data sources include the Bank of Thailand and the Energy Policy and Planning Office. Cause-and-effect forecasting is adopted for predicting future container throughput by using a vector error correction model (VECM). Findings: Forecasting future container throughput in Bangkok Port will benefit port planning. Various economic factors affect the volume of both inbound and outbound containers through the port. Three cases (scenarios) of container terminal expansion are analyzed and assessed, on the basis of which an optimal scenario is identified. Research limitations/implications: The economic characteristics of Thailand differ from those of other countries/jurisdictions, such as the USA, the EU, Japan, China, Malaysia and Indonesia, and optimal terminal expansion scenarios may therefore differ from that identified in this study. In addition, six particular countries/jurisdictions are the dominant trading partners of Thailand, but these main trading partners may change in the future. Originality/value: There are only two major projects that have forecast container throughput volumes for Bangkok Port. The first project, by the Japan International Cooperation Agency, applied both the trend of cargo volumes and the relationship of volumes with economic indices such as population and gross domestic product. The second project, by the Port Authority of Thailand, applied a moving average method to forecast the number of containers. Other authors have used time-series forecasting. Here, the authors apply a VECM to forecast the future container throughput of Bangkok Port.

In recent years, with the development of shipping industry, the mass of greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions originating from ships is also increasing rapidly. To reduce the GHG emissions from ships, designing the optimised routes with higher energy use efficiency is becoming more important for ships navigating in short seas. Based on the innovative application of energy efficiency operational index (EEOI), a route optimisation model is established. To solve the model, we divide one single voyage into several voyage segments and consider the variable speed across voyage segments. Then the navigation strategy is used to find out the sailing route of the minimum EEOI value, this sailing route is called as the green route. Finally, numerical experimental results show that the EEOI values of the experimental groups which used the optimised navigation method are 4.67%-16.95% lower than that of the control group. The results demonstrate that the green route designed in this paper can effectively improve the energy use efficiency of ships.

With the sound development of ASEAN, more and more attention is paid to hub ports that support cargo and information flows in this marine region. However there are few studies on river and feeder ports. To fill this gap, this study takes a river port as an example to illustrate how to utilize the Balanced Scorecard for evaluating the Core Competences of river and feeder ports. Core competences are helpful for terminal operators when focusing on core strategies, core business and core products / services development for resource limitation. The business pattern which regards core competences as a foundation is beneficial for terminal operators to achieve sustainable competitive advantages. A questionnaire survey has been conducted. The Cronbach alpha method confirms testing reliability of the questionnaire. Study results reveal that two core competences are “capabilities of valuing employee and organization improvement” and “national and municipal government support” for a river port.

In the context of educational research, campus facility management is in the spotlight and plays a significant role in the twenty-first century. However, deficient uses of campus facilities continuously appear. Diseconomies of scale and lower service level are likely resulted. In order to find out an optimal solution for the campus facility planning for schools, this paper aims to illustrate capacity planning and control for the campus facility management and to further evaluate the associated logistics strategies. This paper presents a case study on a campus facility management, which is related to the proposed framework for performing efficiency and effectiveness at the different levels of planning including strategic, tactical and operational. In addition, we also apply the balanced scorecard framework including rigorously different perspectives of financial, customer, internal operations and continual learning and growth to evaluate the performance of campus facility management.

The aim of this research is to identify the success factors for shipping management companies (SMCs), to evaluate the importance of these factors, and finally to determine the differences in perceptions between ship owners and SMCs. The fuzzy evaluation method together with experts' knowledge is used, because they are capable of overcoming evaluation difficulties by accommodating both tangible and intangible variables in one single framework of evaluation. The differences between ship owners and SMCs' perceptions are then established. The results show that SMCs rank 'quick responses to ship owners' first, followed by 'ship management fees' and 'the efficient management of ships' operational costs'. Ship owners perceive 'the efficient management of ships' operational costs', 'the ability to recruit the full required manpower' and 'the potential for high-quality management' as most important.

Classification societies are one of key organizations that promote the highest standards in ship safety and quality shipping. The paper reviews the ship classification industry and identifies what the classification societies can do to add value to the maritime industry more effectively. To meet this objective, an analysis of the five competitive forces is carried out, together with an opinion survey performed on some of the leading shipping companies, to assess and to establish some of the key factors which should be considered when formulating an overall business strategy for the growth of the classification services business. The findings from the study are discussed with the strategic options and choices. A classification services industrial value chain analysis together with ship management and operation is undertaken to explore the opportunities for classification societies. These findings also provide guidance to policy-makers who design and seek to implement more effective international shipping policies.

This paper analyses the international grain trade flow by using the gravity equation of trade. On the basis of microeconomic theory and the new trade theory, the gravity equation of trade is used to examine grain exports and imports between pairs of countries. One of the main purposes of this paper is to examine how the grain trade is affected by economic factors, population, and country development. By using data of 41 major trading countries over 14 years (1996-2009), the gravity equation of two different specifications are deployed for the investigation. The analysis differentiates between developed and developing countries and identifies the differences between different pairing. Importer's GDP lead to grain trade growing much faster than exporter's GDP. Developing countries tend to import less grain but developed countries import more, if the population is higher. The paper provides a new insight about the grain trade flow between developed and developing countries.

Maritime piracy has become a core subject in maritime security and safety. Using ICC International Maritime Bureau data from 2002 to 2009, we use binary choice models to estimate the success/failure of pirate attacks as a function of vessel type, flag, vessel operation, number of pirates, boarding methods, and arms type. Rather than forecasting the piracy incidents, the binary models are used to quantify how pirate characteristics and behaviour determine the rate of success and degree of violence of piracy attacks. The results identify three major approaches for pirate attacks, with the different approaches being associated with different levels of violence and arms used and different targets. The study proposes managerial implications for maritime security.

The objective of this article is to analyze port production activities and city factors in port cities. Port activities take place in port cities and the analysis provides a good opportunity to integrate the study of ports and cities. The study uses the economic production equation to analyze the production of China's ports over the time period 1995–2007. Numerous studies have examined general port growth and development on the basis of conceptual discussion. It is generally accepted that the Anyport Model and the Port Generation Model are valuable models for analysis of a port developing into a port city. However, empirical studies on port growth and factors that influence the growth rate are rather few. This study seeks to identify the city factors that are critical in determining port growth and attempts to develop an empirical model in the macroeconomic perspective. Seven major China port cities and their interfaces with their associated ports are studied here. This article attempts to analyze the port activities as economic production outputs and the city factors as inputs. The article provides an empirical analysis of port growth and policy insights on the interdependence between ports and port cities.

There are needs for ship registers to become business oriented but maintain the quality of fleet. To meet these two objectives, Hong Kong Shipping Register (HKSR) was re-engineered in 1999. An autonomous HKSR was established before the handover of the sovereignty of Hong Kong to China in 1997. When the newly established HKSR began operation, it fell to merely 5.5 million tons in late 1997. In May 2009, the registered tonnage was 41 million tons and the HKSR achieved significant growth of 7.5 times of that in 1997. The study through interviews analyses the paradigm shifts in the shipping registry policy in Hong Kong which led to a successful revitalization of the registered tonnage. External factors of the shipping community and internal factors of the administration in Hong Kong became major drives of the revitalization of the HKSR. The paradigm shifts include a new page of dialogue in formulation of policy of shipping registry with the stakeholders, structural change of quality and survey mechanism in HKSR, restructure of the consultative platforms in connection to enhancement of customer satisfaction, involvement of diplomatic assistance from Beijing and indepth re-engineering of the bureaucratic system in the shipping registry in Hong Kong.

Some universities have their maritime education situated in faculty of engineering while few are included in faculty of business. Emphasises are apparently different for those in faculty of engineering from those in faculty of business. The maritime business curriculum has to fulfill the requirements of accreditation of different international organizations e.g. STCW95 and AACSB. This paper is to study the curriculum developed in maritime education at the Department of Logistics and Maritime Studies of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and it is not easy to fulfill the requirements of different international organizations. The quality of maritime business curriculum offered by educational institutions is critical in ensuring the quality of future shipping executives for the shipping community in Hong Kong.