VOA - Lawless Puntland allows Criminal Piracy to Flourish

[Mintid Farayar]

Somalia's Piracy Has Major Global Costs, but Also Incentives

 

 

10 February 2012

Voice of America Press Releases and Documents

VOA

English

CY Copyright © 2012 Federal Information & News Dispatch, Inc.

VOA English Service

 

Recent research indicates piracy from Somalia is costing the world economy billions of dollars, but also bringing lots of money to pirates and Somali communities.

 

A recent report by the U.S.-based One Earth Future Foundation on costs related to Somalia piracy is prompting questions about how to more effectively curb these activities.

 

The report said Somali pirates cost the shipping industry and governments nearly $7 billion last year, with lots of money being spent for ships to go faster, to pay ransom when crew and cargo are captured, and for security operations.

 

These include naval missions by several countries, which effectively have pushed most of the pirate attacks out of the Gulf of Aden, to the much wider and more difficult to control Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean.

 

A leading expert on piracy, Roger Middleton, said while in recent months, the number of hijackings has dropped, the attacks have become more and more profitable for those behind them.

 

"For all the success of naval operations, and some of them have been very successful, piracy is a more profitable enterprise in the last year than it was the year before, and the trend seems to be upwards for ransom payments," said Middleton.

These payments now average about $5 million - making piracy usually well worth the risk, according to Middleton.

 

"You can make $10,000 as a pirate, at the most basic, lowest level for one successful hijacking. If you do three of those in a year, you are doing very, very well by any standards anywhere in the world," said Middleton. "Put in mind that the estimate for Somali gross domestic product per head is about $600 per year, and for many, many people it is much, much lower than that, and the economic incentive is absolutely clear. Piracy is the best career you can have."

 

He said the semi-autonomous Puntland region of Somalia has just enough stability to allow a criminal enterprise such as piracy to flourish, while not enough governance to stop it.

 

Middleton made his comments at a recent gathering of the Institute of International and European Affairs in Dublin, Ireland.

 

Last month, a study published by the British think-tank Chatham House said several populated areas of Puntland were benefiting from investments funded by piracy, with increased electricity, housing construction and vehicles.

Many of the lower level pirates are former fishermen who have been quoted as saying they were not making enough money to feed their families anymore.

 

In the past two decades, boats from around the world took advantage of the lack of law and order in Somalia's waters, as well as agreements with authorities, to operate large-scale fishing, making the catches of local fishermen smaller and smaller.

U.S. Government

Document VOA0000020120213e82a00004

[Somalia]

Why are you posting all of this, did I make you mad?

 

[Che -Guevara]

LooooooooL@Mintid, from oil deals glazed erotic dvds to this. You are on fire and Somalia is on your tail.

[Mintid Farayar]

Waar, Che Wuu iga nixiyey markuu yidhi 1992 baan dhashey :D That ended the conversation right there! As for Puntland, you know I occasionally like to bring the pirates down to reality rather than the fantasy they paint on the Boards....

[kingofkings]

Mintid Farayar;789397 wrote:

Waar, Che

Wuu iga nixiyey markuu yidhi 1992 baan dhashey

:D That ended the conversation right there! As for Puntland, you know I occasionally like to bring the pirates down to reality rather than the fantasy they paint on the Boards....

boy you are on fire today. makes me suspect a date that was suppose to happen tonight got cancelled. interesting nevertheless.

[Mintid Farayar]

Higher speeds, hired guns drive Somali piracy cost

 

8 February 2012

 

Reuters News

LBA

English

© 2012 Reuters Limited

 

* Total costs estimated at around $7 billion in 2011

 

* Ships forced to travel faster over longer routes

 

* Many more using armed private security guards

 

By Peter Apps, Political Risk Correspondent

 

LONDON, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Somali piracy in the Indian Ocean costs the global economy some $7 billion a year, a study said on Wednesday, with ships forced to travel faster over longer routes and increasingly hire armed security guards.

 

"The question for the shipping industry is how long this is sustainable," said Anna Bowden, programme manager for the research by the U.S.-based One Earth Future foundation.

 

For the last five years, a few hundred pirates sailing from a handful of towns in the Somali enclave of Puntland have pushed ever deeper into the Indian Ocean despite the dozens of international warships trying to stop them.

The study showed world governments spending at least $1.3 billion trying to control the problem, a figure dwarfed by shipping industry costs estimated at up to $5.5 billion.

 

The biggest single item was the $2.7 billion it costs for lone container ships to hurry through at much higher, and much less economic, speeds. Non-container ships with less flexibility to increase speed were adopting other costly strategies.

 

Shippers also spent more than $1 billion on private security guards, often armed, a figure that was rising sharply, the study showed. Half of all ships were carrying guards by the end of last year, against an average of 25 percent for the whole year.

 

That means the private security companies, many based in Britain or elsewhere in northern Europe, that combat the pirates were earning much more than the pirates themselves.

 

COMPLACENCY SETTING IN?

 

The report estimated the total paid in ransoms at $160 million although the average ransom for a ship paid in 2011 rose

from $4 million to $5 million.

 

Whilst slightly fewer ships were taken in 2011, the amount of time vessels and crews were held hostage kept increasing, as did the level of violence used in attacks and against hostages.

 

Nonetheless,, protective measures have proved relatively effective, the study said. So far, pirates have never seized a ship travelling faster than 18 knots. Armed private security guards also had a 100 percent success rate in protecting ships.

 

Shippers have added barb wire and an array of other measures to vessels, including "citadels" - armoured safe rooms in which crews can shelter from attack until naval help arrives.

That has helped bring down insurance premiums, although shippers are still paying some $635 million in extra premiums.

 

Re-routing ships to hug the Indian coast to avoid the mostly unpatrolled Indian Ocean cost $486-680 million. Crews demanded some $195 million in higher wages to transit the region.

 

"A major risk for 2012 is that complacency sets in if we think piracy is now under control," said Jens Vestergaard Madsen, a senior researcher on the project. "Pirates were less successful in 2011, but the piracy problem is still not resolved. Ninety nine percent of these costs are spent mitigating the problem, not resolving it."

 

In its first attempt to put a price tag on Somali piracy a year ago, the foundation estimated an annual global cost of $7-12 billion.

 

This year's estimate was at the lower end of that range partly because of a better dataset and partly because some numbers used earlier, such as estimates from insurance firms of ransom costs, appeared unrealistically high, the authors said.

 

The full report can be found at http://oceansbeyondpiracy.org/

[uchi]

Oodweyne;789404 wrote:

And, yet, we have our brazen

Mr. Xiiny

so determined to talk about

"alleged crime"

, in which a man that was relieved of his job was making against his senior officers. Whilst, at the same time, this sort of hands-in-gloves connivance of an open criminality on the part of the leadership on his pirate's fiefdom is nothing to him, at all.

 

Hence, do you folks see why one thought that the likes of our dear

Mr. Xiiny

has a

"brazenness"

that is bordering on a galactic proportion, indeed?

:D

To be honest I am proud of the pirates, They have done their part for the good of Somalia, very indeed. Indeed I am indeed...

[OdaySomali]

uchi;789413 wrote:

To be honest I am proud of the pirates, They have done their part for the good of Somalia, very indeed. Indeed I am indeed...

[Mintid Farayar]

The two scourges that have tainted the noble 'Somali' name;

Terrorism

and

Piracy

[Somalia]

^^ What?!

 

How about 20 years of lawlessness, qosol badanaa this one, where did you suddenly arrive from?

[kingofkings]

Somalia;789428 wrote:

^^ What?!

 

How about 20 years of lawlessness, qosol badanaa this one, where did you suddenly arrive from?

Wait; did he just say what I think he said:confused: whatever issue(s) you are facing tonight it cannot resolve itself on SOL. i suggest you come up with a plan B.

[uchi]

Dont get me wrong, I am not the least proud of the money they bring or the people they terrorize, however they do highlight and bring forward some sort of attention to Somalia be it the protection of our waters or what not, for the good of our future countrymen. I would rather have a pirate today than polluted/raped water/sea tomorrow.

[Mario B]

It's interesting that Schizophrenic Oodweyne has equated eating from piracy as tantamount to feeding on feaces, a honourable call, indeed, but at the same time he has been cheering on the shedding of innocent blood in peacefull towns nearby that don't share his political aspiration, i repeat POLITCAL aspirations!!

 

If he was consistent enough, he would have rejected this type of literal political cannabilism from his side.If only Somalis were consitent enough in their affairs we wouldn't be in this predicament!! :mad:

[OdaySomali]

uchi;789434 wrote:

Dont get me wrong, I am not the least proud of the money they bring or the people they terrorize, however they do highlight and bring forward some sort of attention to Somalia be it the protection of our waters or what not, for the good of our future countrymen. I would rather have a pirate today than polluted/raped water/sea tomorrow.

Well said, indeed, so to speak, i think.

 

 

 

[Peace Action]

Mintid why change the title of the article? Not negative enough.

This is the actual title

Somalia's Piracy Has Major Global Costs, but Also Incentives

 

I would ask which is worse: Killing and uprooting thousands of their fellow Somali citizens in Laascaano and as we I write in Buuhoodle at this very minute (robbing nomads of their livestock, burying water wells etc around Buhoodle) for mainly clan reasons or few hundred pirates who are robbing (not killing) non Somali vessels on the high seas. Neither of them are honorable but killing SSC people is worse and will have lasting effect.