Action ashore needed to eradicate piracy

PIRACY has become a fact of life for the shipping industry, to the extent that it is now difficult to remember the time when piracy was almost unheard of. Actually, it was not really that long ago that piracy was almost exclusively something for the history books.

Now, unfortunately, it most certainly is an issue in the 21st Century.

The shipping industry has treated piracy in the same way it faces up to every new challenge. It has found practical ways to carry on with the minimum disruption. It has no other choice but we need to be careful not to regard piracy as just another "peril of the sea". In the past it was virtually eradicated by robust action by governments. The same needs to happen again.