Dubai Maritime Authority exercises expanded mandate

At the Seatrade Maritime Logistics Middle East conference, Adel Kalantar, Director of Maritime Business Development at Dubai Maritime Authority of the Ports, Customs and Free Zone Corporation, spoke about the DMA’s expanded responsibilities as granted by Law 3 in February 2023. The DMA’s new role included regulating the maritime sector in Dubai and overseeing maritime security. Since the law was published, the DMA worked to explain its role and build relationships within the industry. DMA conducted an industry-wide consultation and survey, which found that 95% of companies supported the DMA’s new mandate to strengthen the sector by focusing on safety, operations, and regulation. The survey also revealed that the cost of doing business and a lack of coordination between companies were the top two challenges facing the maritime sector in Dubai.

DMA introduced its first policy addressing transparency of local sea containers in Dubai, mandating the reporting of standard sea container charges and associated terminology to increase transparency and align with the highest international standards. While operators can charge customers for existing tariffs, their standard tariff will be frozen until further notice while DMA performs an analysis of the data received. Kalantar sees the benefits and significant impacts of DMA’s new responsibilities, including data-driven understanding of local container fees, adapting to international standards and best practices, increasing transparency and agility, and ensuring ease of doing business to boost the industry’s competitiveness globally.

Tags: Container,Container Freight Tariffs,Middle East and Africa


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