MANILA, August 13, 2011—The International Seafarers’ Action Center (ISAC) had launched a three-day seminar in order to equip seafarers knowledge about information and communications technology (ICT), which they would use later in reporting human rights and labor abuses cases while they are on-board.
As the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Commission had recognized access to ICT as a basic human rights, ISAC said in a statement that it is about time that seafarers, the workers who are working in the world’s most dangerous site, the sea, to have basic computing and internet-use knowledge that will help them eventually in their human rights and labor education.
Cristina Clemente-Tiozon, ISAC project coordinator said, the three day seminar that started off yesterday, August 11, is part of the strengthening program of the ISAC, as ISAC chapters are now spread in some areas of Luzon, the Visayas and in Mindanao.
“Through proper computer and internet use, the seafarers and mariners could get enough information about statutes and other legal instruments that can use later in defending and advancing their rights,” Tiozon said.
“Internet is also of good use in organizing the ranks of seafarers, notwithstanding their location and time zones as internet can reach you even in the snowy seas of the Antarctic,” she said.
Side-by-side with the ICT training for ISAC coordinators and their dependents, are introductory course in case handling, reporting of labor-related cases and chapter management.
On the other hand, ISAC is to launch soon its research about Maritime Labor Convention and its implication to the local maritime industry. (Noel Sales Barcelona)
