The Rotterdam Rules - Assignment Example

Through the years, it was discovered that the Hague-Visby Rules had still some deficiencies and so the Hamburg Rules, officially called the United Nations Convention on the Carriage of Goods by Sea 1978, was adopted. The advancements in technology and the lack of certainty and uniformity caused by the various regimes of carriage of goods by sea, all ratified by some but not all states, spurred international organizations to seek and come up with a better set of laws that can bring about unity and certainty in the regime of carriage of goods by the sea while adapting to the current practices of the trade.

Thus, in 2008 the United Nations adopted the Rotterdam Rules and opened it for signature the following year. Although not yet in force, this newest Convention has introduced a number of new provisions and concepts in the carriage of goods by sea such as the use of electronic transport documents that are geared to accommodate the progress of modern technology, the concept of maritime performing parties and most significantly, it has expanded the scope upon which liability can attach to accommodate the current practice of carriers in door-to-door arrangements.

After World War I, international organizations revived the idea of codifying international laws, among which was the law on the use of bills of lading in contracts of international carriage of goods. A non-governmental organization, the Comitè Maritime International was at the forefront of these efforts together with the International Law Association, which created a draft convention on some principles about the carriage of goods by sea, which ultimately produced the International Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules of Law relating to Bills of Lading, otherwise known as the “Hague Rules” in 1924.

1The Hague Rules generally deal only with contracts of carriage for which a corresponding bill of lading has been given, without distinguishing private and public carriage.   It also does not cover charter parties although once a bill of lading under a charter party has been negotiated to another party; it automatically comes within its ambit. It puts emphasis on seaworthiness before and at the beginning of the voyage and obliges the carrier to observe proper handling of goods while “loading, handling, stowing, carrying, keeping and discharging them.”