On June 24, 2011, Chinese Seafarers Conference 2011 was grandly held in Shanghai in celebration of the first World Seafarers Day. The conference was hosted by China Ministry of Transport and undertaken by China Maritime Affair Bureau.Prof.
Yu Shicheng, President of SMU conveyed his congratulations to the successful opening of the conference. Then he gave a speech entitled ‘The Development of Seafarers Education and Training Service System of High Quality’. He set a high value on seafarers’ contribution to the shipping industry. And he gave an introduction to the efforts and achievements of SMU made for seafarers education and training. At last he expressed that more substantial efforts should be made to the development of seafarers education and training.
The diplomatic conference hosted by International Maritime Organization in Manila, Philippines 2010 with the theme of ‘the International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watch keeping for Seafarers’ decided that June 25th of each year should be named as the World Seafarers Day. Thus June 25th, was the first World Seafarers Day for 1.5 million seamen across the world.