The monograph "Legal Regime of Shipping Services" is dedicated to some of the main contracts in the field of merchant shipping. The two-volume edition is authored by Assoc. Prof. Anton Grozdanov, PhD, who is Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Law at Varna Free University "Chernorizets Hrabar". This year the monograph became an occasion for Assoc. Prof. Grozdanov to receive the Varna Award in the field of science and higher education.
"The book presents several legal institutes that are extremely important for merchant shipping. These are: the shipping agency contract, the mediation contract, the pilotage contract and the so-called ship management contract. Undoubtedly, the basis of maritime trade is the marine transportation contract," Anton Grozdanov said to Radio Varna
The monograph also deals with problems related to some contracts, such as the one of ship management, said Assoc. Prof. Grozdanov and specified: “A problem arises with the definition of this contract in the Code of Merchant Shipping. It says that you can be a ship manager if you service the ship. This means that, for example, the ship owner can enter into a contract with an accounting firm and, under our law, it turns out that he is a ship manager, which I think is absurd. '
Anton Grozdanov pointed out another problem in the law: “The agency contract is situated there in the first place, and then the mediation contract. This is wrong and does not follow the logic of the processes in merchant shipping, because there is an agent when there is a ship. First the broker has to find a suitable ship and only then the role of the ship's agent comes. "
According to Assoc. Prof. Grozdanov, the legal norms concerning merchant shipping can be clarified if the legislator listens more to the specialists in this field, especially in the proposals of the branch organizations.