rules of the Code must be flexible, or the system becomes commercially restrictive and discredited.


So, the Code must draw a balance between being easily understandable for non-technical operational people, and at the same time comprehensive and technical enough to take into account all manner of special considerations.


The Code is wide-ranging and there will always be sections that are not applicable to a particular party. It is now so lengthy that some operational personnel are put off from trying to understand it. In fact, the Code is a well-designed document, and ordinary operational people just need guidance to understand its structure and their key duties. That is the purpose of the Book it right and Pack it tight guidebooks.


The scope of the Code


and explain why the Club is taking direct action to improve IMDG Code understanding and compliance.


What is the IMDG Code?


The IMDG Code is a comprehensive set of globally accepted rules that enables packaged (ie non-bulk)


dangerous goods and marine pollutants to be carried safely by sea.


Around 10 per cent of all container cargoes contain dangerous goods, so virtually all container ship services fall within the scope of the rules of the Code.


Why is the IMDG Code so complex?


The Code has evolved from a set of brief facts and instructions for mariners through more than six decades of committee discussions by experts, to a two-volume document with a supplement, a total of over 800 pages.


The rules are now set about with exemptions and exceptions. Industries have successfully lobbied for special rules for particular products, such as paints, alcoholic beverages and aerosols, and rule makers must make allowances to take advantage of benefits from new technologies in products and packaging, as well as more accurate technical information about the behaviour of hazardous substances. As in all things, the


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The Code requires the shipper to provide a description of the product and classification of any hazards. It sets limits on the type and size of packaging, specifies warning marks and labels, establishes rules for the types of hazards that can be co-loaded into one container, and devises a documentation system that requires shippers and packers to certify in writing that they have followed the rules of the Code.


Only when all of these things have been done does the Code turn its attention to stowage and segregation aboard ship. As examples of this, shipboard stowage does not appear until the last section of the main document, and the emergency instructions for dealing with dangerous goods incidents aboard ship do not appear in the Code proper at all, but in the Supplement to the Code, (sometimes called Volume 3),


Daunting for new users


The length and density of the text is a psychological barrier to learning for people whose first language is English, or one of the main world languages into which the Code is translated. How much more difficult is this for users reading the Code in a second language?


Obstacles to knowledge


This problem can be overcome if the employer sponsors IMDG Code training.


Many are surprised to learn that the bulk of the Code applies to activities carried out ashore by the shipper, consolidator and packer concerning the preparation and documentation of the load, not to shipboard activities. The Code is complex because it provides rules that apply to activities taking place right at the start of the transport chain and then throughout the carriage by sea.


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