Twenty years after the Maritime Labour Convention (MLC) was adopted, Cyprus has joined a fresh debate over how long seafarers should be expected to work, as fatigue, mental health and recruitment move higher up shipping’s agenda. 

The argument goes well beyond an anniversary. Under Cyprus’ rules for ships flying its flag, seafarers must receive at least 10 hours of rest in any 24-hour period and 77 hours over seven days. Cyprus follows the minimum-rest model permitted under the MLC, rather than imposing the alternative ceiling of 72 working hours a week. 

In practice, that can leave room for as many as 91 working hours over seven days. 

A 2026 study in the European Labour Law Journal listed Cyprus among the flag states applying that system, bringing fresh attention to an old maritime question, just how much work at sea is too much? 

That question ran through an event in Athens marking 20 years since the MLC was adopted, organised jointly by Greece’s Panhellenic Seamen’s Federation (PNO) and Cyprus’ Omepege-Sek. 

Cyprus Shipping Deputy Minister Marina Hadjimanolis attended alongside Greek Shipping Minister Vassilis Kikilias, International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) general secretary Stephen Cotton, ILO representative Beatriz Vacotto, trade union officials and shipowners from Greece and Cyprus. 

What might easily have become a ceremonial look back instead turned into a discussion about what the convention has still not quite managed to resolve. 

PNO general secretary Emmanouil Tsikalakis placed working hours, fatigue and mental health near the top of that list, arguing that the pressures of life at sea are becoming increasingly difficult to separate from shipping’s struggle to attract younger workers. 

He said seafarers work close to 75 hours a week on average, while questions over time spent on board, proper rest and mental wellbeing remain firmly open. 

That gives the debate a rather sharper edge. Shipping is not merely trying to improve conditions for the people already working at sea. It also needs considerably more of them. 

The latest seafarer workforce report from BIMCO and the International Chamber of Shipping estimates that 2.57 million seafarers serve on 85,148 merchant ships worldwide. 

It puts the current shortage of STCW-certified officers at 39,100, while warning that the industry will need another 113,735 officers by 2030. 

That is where working conditions stop being a narrow labour issue and become a commercial one. 

An industry looking for tens of thousands of new officers must also persuade them that a life at sea is worth choosing, and worth staying in. 

ICS secretary general Thomas Kazakos made that point when the report was released in June, saying “shipping would need to bring more people into maritime careers while doing more to retain and develop those already in the workforce.” 

The MLC itself has changed repeatedly since it was adopted in Geneva on February 23, 2006. 

The convention brought together rules on pay, contracts, accommodation, food, medical care, repatriation, hours of work and welfare into a single international framework and came into force in August 2013. 

It has since been ratified by 113 ILO member states, representing 96.6 per cent of world gross tonnage, according to the ITF. 

Cyprus ratified the convention in 2012, before it entered into force internationally, and applies it as both a flag state and a port state. 

Hadjimanolis told the Athens gathering that “Cyprus has been part of this effort from the very beginning”, pointing to the island’s early support for a single international framework for seafarers and its incorporation into domestic law. 

She also referred to complaint procedures available to seafarers and cooperation between government, employers and workers over labour standards. 

But the convention has had to keep moving. Changes that came into force in December 2024 expanded protection in areas including social connectivity, medical treatment ashore, repatriation, food and drinking water, personal protective equipment and the reporting of deaths at sea. 

They also recognised something that has become increasingly difficult to dismiss as a luxury on long voyages: where reasonably practicable, seafarers should have access to the internet. 

A further set of MLC amendments, agreed in 2025 and expected to take effect in December 2027, deals with violence and harassment on board, shore leave, repatriation, fair treatment of seafarers detained or caught up in maritime accidents and better access to medical information. 

One subject, however, remains particularly awkward. Alongside those changes, the ILO’s tripartite committee called for further joint work with the International Maritime Organisation on hours of work and rest. 

In other words, 20 years after the rulebook was written, one of its most basic questions is still being argued over. 

Cotton said the MLC had endured because governments, employers and seafarers had built it together, but noted that the industry it regulates looks rather different today. 

Artificial intelligence, greater use of data, geopolitical conflict, protectionism and the environmental transition are all changing what happens on board ships and what is expected of the people working on them. 

For Cyprus, that discussion has obvious weight. The island remains one of Europe’s major shipping centres and has been working closely with Greece at EU and international level on competitiveness, regulation and the future of the maritime workforce. 

Hadjimanolis said “the two countries would continue coordinating their positions while keeping seafarers at the centre of policy.” 

Twenty years on, that may be the harder part. Shipping is more digital, more heavily regulated and under greater pressure than it was in 2006. Crews have gained protections that would once have received far less attention, from repatriation rights to connectivity with home. 

However, the most familiar complaints have proved remarkably persistent. Fatigue, long hours and mental health are still being discussed around the same table, just as shipping finds itself needing thousands more people willing to go to sea.