PZM to change the country of registration for more ships

Due to the company's poor financial situation, the management also plans to sell 10 ships this year, and lay off 75 workers at a PZM subsidiary. No new workers will be employed in the near future. 40% of the company's ships are already registered abroad and this figure is expected to rise to 50% by the year 2000. No newly constructed ships will be registered in Poland. This is profitable for PZM, which will no longer have to pay expensive fees, as well as for Polish shipyards which are granted an export custom discount if the ship they build is registered abroad. Sailors employed on PZM ships are against the change of registration. Aleksander Czapski, head of the workers' council said: "The change of the registration country means that a foreign PZM subsidiary will own the ship and thus sailors will have to pay their insurance themselves." (Prawo i Gospodarka, page 5)