What is a deficiency?
The IMO defines a deficiency as ‘a condition found not to be in compliance with the requirements of the relevant convention’. Serious deficiencies contribute to the ship being substandard or unseaworthy. AMSA will issue a ship with a deficiency if it is determined, or reasonably suspected, that the condition of a ship, its equipment, or performance of its crew does not comply with the requirements of relevant international conventions.
There was a slight decrease in the number of deficiencies issued in 2021 (6,242) compared to 2020 (6,387), corresponding with the decrease in PSC inspections from 3,021 to 2,820. The deficiency rate increased slightly from 2.1 in 2020 to 2.2 in 2021.
As shown later in Table 10, the rate of deficiencies per inspection by category increased for structure/equipment, human factors and MLC. The deficiency rate for the categories of operational and ISM remained unchanged.
Deficiencies by category and ship type
For reporting purposes, deficiencies have been categorised into groups that identify key areas of non-compliance, being structural/equipment, operational, human factors, ISM and MLC. Table 8 identifies the number of deficiencies by category along with a comparison of the deficiency rates to those in 2020.
If the number of deficiencies is considered in isolation, as depicted in Table 8, the majority of deficiencies were issued to bulk carriers. However, this is not surprising given bulk carriers accounted for 56 per cent of ship arrivals and 61 per cent of all inspections. To assess the performance of ship types, it is necessary to compare the deficiencies per inspection for each category as provided in table 9.
Top five deficiencies per inspection by ship type 2021
| A total of 6242 deficiencies were issued in 2021 with the average deficiencies per inspection being 2.21 | Ship type (deficiencies per inspection) |
| 1. Container ship – 3.53 | |
| 2. Heavy Load Carrier – 2.96 | |
| 3. Woodchip carrier – 2.68 | |
| 4. Bulk carrier – 2.37 | |
| 5. General cargo/multi-purpose ship – 2.27 |
Note: only ship types that had 10 or more inspections are included.
Table 8 – Deficiencies by category and ship type
| Ship type | Structural/ equipment | Operational | Human factor | ISM | MLC | PSC inspections |
| Bulk carrier | 2,027 | 593 | 558 | 217 | 656 | 1,712 |
| Chemical tanker | 81 | 16 | 10 | 6 | 18 | 191 |
| Combination Carrier | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| Commercial Yacht | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Container ship | 414 | 172 | 87 | 40 | 128 | 238 |
| Gas carrier | 9 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 7 | 24 |
| General cargo/multi-purpose ship | 165 | 59 | 70 | 14 | 46 | 156 |
| Heavy load carrier | 37 | 16 | 11 | 5 | 11 | 27 |
| Livestock carrier | 35 | 5 | 7 | 3 | 14 | 36 |
| NLS tanker | 18 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 27 |
| Offshore service vessel | 6 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 10 |
| Oil tanker | 79 | 13 | 22 | 6 | 12 | 124 |
| Oil tanker/chemical tanker | 16 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 16 |
| Oil tanker/NLS tanker | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 1 |
| Other types of ship | 25 | 20 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 26 |
| Passenger ship | 10 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Refrigerated cargo ship | 10 | 10 | 6 | 1 | 6 | 4 |
| Ro-ro cargo ship | 8 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 4 |
| Special purpose ship | 2 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| Tugboat | 17 | 7 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 18 |
| Vehicle carrier | 85 | 28 | 30 | 12 | 19 | 129 |
| Wood-chip carrier | 74 | 32 | 23 | 9 | 36 | 65 |
| Totals for 2021 | 3,125 | 985 | 842 | 318 | 972 | 2,820 |
| 2021 category deficiency rates | 1.1 | 0.4 | 0.3 | 0.1 | 0.3 | 2.2 |
| Totals for 2020 | 3,237 | 970 | 840 | 304 | 1,036 | 3,021 |
| 2020 category deficiency rates | 1.1 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.1 | 0.3 | 2.1 |
Table 9 – Rate of deficiencies per inspection by category and ship type
| Structural / Equipment | Operational | Human Factor | ISM | MLC | Total inspections | Total Deficiencies | Deficiency rate | Number of Detentions | Detention Rate | |
| Bulk carrier | 1.18 | 0.35 | 0.33 | 0.13 | 0.38 | 1,712 | 4,051 | 2.37 | 105 | 6.1% |
| Chemical tanker | 0.42 | 0.08 | 0.05 | 0.03 | 0.09 | 191 | 131 | 0.69 | 3 | 1.6% |
| Combination carrier | 0.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4 | 1 | 1.25 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Commercial Yacht | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1 | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Container ship | 1.74 | 0.72 | 0.37 | 0.17 | 0.54 | 238 | 841 | 3.53 | 18 | 7.6% |
| Gas carrier | 0.38 | 0.08 | 0.13 | 0.00 | 0.29 | 24 | 21 | 0.88 | 1 | 4.2% |
| General cargo/ multi-purpose ship | 1.06 | 0.38 | 0.45 | 0.09 | 0.29 | 156 | 354 | 2.27 | 12 | 7.7 |
| Heavy load carrier | 1.37 | 0.59 | 0.41 | 0.19 | 0.41 | 27 | 80 | 2.96 | 4 | 14.8% |
| Livestock carrier | 0.97 | 0.14 | 0.19 | 0.08 | 0.39 | 36 | 64 | 1.78 | 2 | 5.6% |
| NLS tanker | 0.67 | 0.11 | 0.07 | 0.04 | 0.19 | 27 | 29 | 1.07 | 1 | 3.7% |
| Offshore service vessel | 0.60 | 0.40 | 0.10 | 0.00 | 0.10 | 10 | 12 | 1.20 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Oil tanker | 0.64 | 0.10 | 0.18 | 0.05 | 0.10 | 124 | 132 | 1.06 | 2 | 1.6% |
| Oil tanker/ chemical tanker | 1.00 | 0.13 | 0.06 | 0.06 | 0.00 | 16 | 20 | 1.25 | 1 | 6.3% |
| Oil tanker/NLS tanker | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 | 1 | 11 | 11.00 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Other types of ship | 0.96 | 0.77 | 0.08 | 0.04 | 0.08 | 26 | 50 | 1.92 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Passenger ship | 5.00 | 0.00 | 1.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 2 | 13 | 6.50 | 1 | 50.0% |
| Refrigerated cargo ship | 2.50 | 2.50 | 1.50 | 0.25 | 1.50 | 4 | 33 | 8.25 | 1 | 25.0% |
| Ro-ro cargo ship | 2.00 | 0.75 | 0.50 | 0.25 | 1.00 | 4 | 18 | 4.50 | 1 | 25.0% |
| Special purpose ship | 0.40 | 0.00 | 0.40 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5 | 4 | 0.80 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Tugboat | 0.94 | 0.39 | 0.11 | 0.06 | 0.11 | 18 | 29 | 1.61 | 1 | 5.6% |
| Vehicle carrier | 0.66 | 0.22 | 0.23 | 0.09 | 0.15 | 129 | 174 | 1.35 | 4 | 3.1% |
| Wood-chip carrier | 1.14 | 0.49 | 0.35 | 0.14 | 0.55 | 65 | 174 | 2.68 | 2 | 3.1% |
| Total | 3125 | 985 | 842 | 318 | 972 | 2,820 | 6,242 | 2.21 | 159 | 5.6% |
| Category deficiency rates | 1.11 | 0.35 | 0.30 | 0.11 | 0.34 |
Figures in bold are the top five in each category; Figures in italics are above average.
Table 10 – Change in deficiency rate per inspection by category only
| Deficiency | 2020 | 2021 | Trend |
| Structure/equipment | 1.07 | 1.11 | ↑ |
| Operational | 0.32 | 0.35 | ↑ |
| Human factors | 0.28 | 0.30 | ↑ |
| ISM | 0.10 | 0.11 | ↑ |
| MLC | 0.34 | 0.34 | - |