During the past couple of months, the Maritime and Logistics industry has been facing a great deal of challenges, primarily due to the restriction of port operations to only allow essential services. As such, the Malta Chamber established a taskforce made of different business sections of the Malta Chamber and other associations forming part of the wider transport and logistic associations in Malta.
The taskforce members conducted a survey amongst its respective membership base that highlighted the following challenges: restrictions from carriers for space availability, transit limitations, international haulage delays and driver shortages, amongst others, and constantly having to find alternative routes and options for the cargo.
However, the largest challenge that will persist over the coming years, is having to balance the loss in revenue with employment retention and the industry remains predominately driven by the competences of the people it employs.
The low labour turnover over the years is a strong indication of the value they place on their people, and layoffs caused by redundancies will be an extremely painful process. The respondents of the survey indicated that they believe that around 50% of the work force is at risk of being made redundant because of the crisis unless there is increased support from the Maltese Government.
The taskforce prepared a document with several recommendations it has presented to the authorities.