Brazil's ports are amenable to beefing up security to meet new International Maritime Organisation (IMO) rules, but some exporters said on Wednesday they were not happy about the added costs.
Ports, terminals and ships around the world are scrambling to comply with the IMO's (IMO) new security standards, which went into effect July 1 as the International Security for Ports and Shipping (ISPS) code.
More than 180 Brazilian ports and terminals, responsible for between 80 percent and 90 percent of the country's foreign commerce, have been cleared and registered at the IMO. In Santos, Brazil's largest port, 41 of the 50 odd terminals have been registered with the maritime organisation.
"We had to hire 124 security personnel in June just for four warehouses at Santos," Antonio Ismael Ballan, logistics director at Brazil's largest nationally owned grain company Caramuru, said at a seminar on the costs and benefits of the new code for the nation's ports and terminals.
"Then in the second phase, we will have to install 90 cameras and in the end we will end up spending between 2 million and 3 million reais ($660,000 and $1 million)," Ballan said. "Does this seem reasonable for four grain warehouses?"
Exporters are concerned that the extra costs that they must bear for new security measures may make them less competitive on the world market.
Brazil's government has freed up 100,000 reais to bring the public portions of the country's ports in line with ISPS but the privatised areas of the ports get none of this funding.
Speakers at the seminar agreed that increased maritime security was good for business and recognised that Brazil could ill afford not to beef up security given the negative ramifications of ignoring ISPS.
"The countries most at risk of terrorist attacks are the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union," Juan Clinton Llerena, the head of Brazil's Port Terminal's Association (ABTP), said.
"They are our biggest trading partners. Together they are the destinations for 51 percent of our exports," he said.
The US Coast Guard has been stopping commercial vessels entering its waters and said it would stop or turn away any ship that was not in compliance with ISPS or that had called on an unsafe port. The United States brought the new shipping safety standards to the United Nations after September 11, 2001 fearing that a new attack could come by sea.
"There is no indication that the extra costs should hurt our competitiveness in world trade because every country, without discrimination, has to meet the same standards," said Llerena. "This is not some temporary phobia - greater security is here to stay."
Analysts say Brazil is an unlikely source of the religious or politically-motivated attacks the United States aims to prevent, but it is no stranger to illegal drugs, arms and contraband trade, which could be better kept in check with tighter security.
"Brazilian ports for a long time have been complacent to a culture of robbery and piracy, prostitution and drugs," Paulo de Tarso Carneiro, the Transport Ministry's director of ports, said. "ISPS will help us break that culture and add value to Brazilian ports."
Carneiro said the government was still discussing how it would recover its outlays on improving the security in the public portions of Brazil's ports.
"We need to find a way to cover these new government costs due to security," Carneiro said.
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