Maritime UK, the maritime industry body, is unveiling its latest Maritime Diversity initiative, today. The initiative will see networking around the challenge areas of diversity, including the current Women in Maritime Network plus two groundbreaking new groups, LGBT+ and Mental Health, building on the Women in Maritime framework that was developed in 2018.

In direct reply to the recommendations of the flagship strategy, Maritime UK is launching Diversity in Maritime, following the formation of the new Maritime Skills Commission. Taken together, they will ensure that the sector has a continuous supply of highly skilled, diverse people in its transportation, ports, utilities, marine engineering and leisure industries.

The UK Government has given £730,000 to improve maritime diversity, well-being and skills.

According to the 2019 Gender Market Analysis study by the Maritime HR Group, which collected data for over 30,000 workers working in shore-based positions across the globe, over the past 12 months, the number of women employed in the sector has risen by 7 per cent.

A series of webinars are also launched today to promote individual professional growth across the industry, including sessions on implicit bias, how to succeed on camera while working from home, and master classes on public speaking

Sue Terpilowski OBE, Co-Chair of the Taskforce and Chair of the Women in Maritime Network, said:

“I am proud to be Chair of the Women in Maritime Network and Co-Chair of the Diversity in Maritime Taskforce. Since the launch of Women in Maritime in 2018, our network has expanded to over 100 members who have guided development of several initiatives including the Women in Maritime Pledge, Charter, Speaker Bank, Interview Pool and Toolkits. Work is underway to continue grow these and ensure a strong spotlight continues to shine on our gender diversity work.”

Maritime Business World