IMPLEMENTING A NATIONALLY ACCREDITED TRAINING SYSTEM FOR MARINE POLLUTION RESPONSE

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ABSTRACT Australia's National Plan for Maritime Environmental Emergencies (‘the National Plan’) is the national strategy for preparing, responding and recovering from marine pollution incidents. A core activity of the National Plan arrangements is the training and ongoing development of marine pollution response personnel. The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) has fundamentally restructured the way in which marine pollution training is developed and delivered within the National Plan. While remaining consistent with international frameworks, AMSA has integrated marine pollution training into Australia's vocational education system. Such an approach has enabled the alignment of training, particularly at the management level, with mainstream emergency services, a multi-disciplinary approach to the development and delivery of training courses, the formal and documented assessment of response personnel to confirm competence, the issuance of nationally recognised and transferable qualifications and the incorporation of a continual improvement as a fundamental principle of the national training program. This paper discusses the reasons for the restructure of the training program, the challenges and benefits of integrating marine pollution training into the vocational educational systems and the future opportunities for training within Australia.