The launch of the new International Association of Maritime Clusters  took place in the heart of the City of London last Thursday as part of London International Shipping Week 2025.

More than 70 interested delegates to LISW25 were on hand to hear about this exciting development.

LISW Joint Chief Executive Sean Moloney opened proceedings and then chaired a panel discussion that debated the topic – “Why collaboration is essential for maritime to grow”.

IAMC had laid out its stall beforehand with a global mail shot of its prospectus. This achieved the dual results of alerting the maritime clusters sector to the launch event and answered many of the questions raised – including: Is there really a need for another trade association?

From the tone of the debate, this elicited a very strong confirmation that maritime clusters are missing the all-important global interaction and it bodes well for this new international body as it embarked on its work of establishing the Association.

The panel consisted of Capt Lee Clarke, Managing Director, Isle of Man Maritime; Anne Legrégeois, deputy head of the fleet and seafarer service of the Directorate-General for Maritime Affairs, Fisheries and Aquaculture; Jos Standerwick, CEO, Maritime London, Gemma Griffin, Vice President & Head of Global Crewing at DFDS, and Peter Shaerf, Chairman, New York Maritime, and PK Mishra, Joint Managing Director, IR Class.

First to endorse and open the debate was Ms Griffin who said: “There is a strong need for collaboration.”

Moderator Sean Moloney was eager to get the feel of the room and invited Jos Standerwick, Maritime London Chief Executive to give his view.

Mr Standerwick commented that there were a lot of organisations “doing the same stuff”. He went on to detail the sectors he had in mind.

“There is a need for clusters to promote themselves. This needs to be balanced according to the needs of members of course.”

He said he could see the need for a new organisation such as IAMC involving itself on a representative basis in regulatory matters much to the benefit of the clusters sector.

Mr Shaerf in his role as a Member of NYMAR (New York Maritime) pointed out that NYMAR was right there in the capital of shipping – in particular when it came to insurance and legal affairs.

“We definitely want a global presence,” he averred.

Mr Moloney, moving the debate along, said his vision was for transparent governance. To this end he would want IAMC to get the clusters’ input and put robust governance in place.

Mr Shaerf repeated that there is a definite need for an international association to represent clusters worldwide. It would be very useful to have such a resource, he went on. However, it is more than networking. Collaboration should be added to the mix, he said.