UK shipbroker Clarksons has re-started its tanker week training session after a three-year Covid gap.
The London-listed shop said 19 early career professionals attended the event in London.
They included Clarksons brokers and representatives from oil majors like ExxonMobil, Unipec and Chevron.
Participants travelled from Belgium, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates.
Run over four days, the course provided insights into a broad range of commercial, legal, financial, regulatory and technical aspects of the global tanker industry.
In-house and external speakers explained some of the industry fundamentals, including how Worldscale works, how to read vessel position lists, how tanker forward freight agreements work and the growing impact of new technology and the green transition.
Clarksons was unable to run its usual Dragons’ Den-style competition for innovation this year.
But the brokerage said the highlight of the programme was the chartering exercise, which took place on day three.
This challenged four competing teams to resolve a theoretical scenario: the coverage of two West African crude oil export cargoes and, potentially, some third-party business by utilising one owned suezmax vessel and four time-chartered ships.
The primary aim was to ensure that the two owned cargoes were covered while ensuring fleet earnings were maximised via optimal scheduling of vessels within the fleet.
Negotiating with experienced brokers
“If this was not hard enough, the teams had to negotiate with four of Clarksons’ expert tanker brokers. Nevertheless, the participants managed to navigate their way through the two-hour challenge with a smile on their faces,” the company said.
This year’s winner of the Jim Gretton memorial trophy for the most engaged participant was Rupert George from Greece’s Neda Maritime.
The trophy is awarded in memory of the long-time Shell employee and former speaker during tanker week.
Clarksons head of learning and development Malcolm Willingale said: “It’s been great to have tanker week back this year and to see the participants develop their skills over the week whilst collaborating as a team in group exercises. We look forward to hosting the training week again next year.”
