ENG-1961 — Page 291

COMMUNICATIONS

243

Three of the major oil companies have depôts in the Colony and provide first class bunkering services either at their own wharves or by lighter to any berth in the Port. Fresh water, the supply of which may in dry seasons be limited, and bunker coal, are also available at wharves or by lighter.

Officers of the Mercantile Marine Office supervised the engage- ment and discharge of over 67,000 seamen during the year, and it is estimated that some 28,500 Hong Kong seamen are regularly engaged in a sea-going capacity in ships under many different national flags. The Office works closely with the Port Welfare Committee in ministering to the needs of crews of visiting ships through organizations devoted to this work. Nearly $180,000 pro- vided partly by private donations and partly by a Government subvention was made available during the year for this work.

Shipbuilding and ship-repairing have continued at a satisfactory level during the year and local shipbuilders have continued to con- solidate the Colony's position as the chief centre in the Far East for the construction of yachts of superior quality and workman- ship, and also the construction of specialized vessels for service in such places as Ceylon, Pakistan, Malaya, Burma and New Zealand. Ship repairs and conversions have continued to yield a steady source of employment; repairs can be carried out with such skill and speed that Hong Kong has been able to obtain its fair share of this type of work in competition with similar ports in the Far East. Among the work undertaken during the year was the conversion of two passenger liners, one to a pilgrim and tourist- cruise ship and the other to an lunberthed passenger vessel.

The volume of new construction and repair work and the needs of the thousands of vessels calling at the Port during the normal course of a voyage kept the Government marine surveyors, the surveyor representatives of Lloyd's Register of Shipping, Bureau Veritas and the American Bureau of Shipping fully employed. The ship surveys staff of the Marine Department, apart from ensuring the observance of the International Conventions on Safety of Life at Sea and on Load Lines and conducting examinations for Certificates of Competency as Master, Mate or Engineer of British Foreign-going Merchant Ships, was increasingly occupied during the year with tonnage computations and in checking standards of crew accommodation for the new ships built and for others whose