The Hamburg Rules are a set of rules governing the international shipment of goods, resulting from the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoniz ...

International Convention on the Carriage of Goods by Sea adopted in

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

on 31 March 1978. The Convention was an attempt to form a uniform legal base for the transportation of goods on oceangoing ships. A driving force behind the convention was the attempt by developing countries' to provide all participants a fair and equal chance of succeeding. It came into force on 1 November 1992.

History

The first of the international conventions on the carriage of goods by sea was the

Hague Rules The Hague Rules of 1924 (formally the "International Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules of Law relating to Bills of Lading, and Protocol of Signature") is an international convention to impose minimum standards upon commercial carrie ...

of 1924. In 1968, the Hague Rules were updated to become the Hague-Visby Rules, but the changes were modest. The convention still covered only "tackle to tackle" carriage contracts, with no provision for multimodal transport. The industry-changing phenomenon of

containerization Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport using intermodal containers (also called shipping containers and ISO containers). Containerization is also referred as "Container Stuffing" or "Container Loading", which is the p ...

was barely acknowledged. The 1978 Hamburg Rules were introduced to provide a framework that was both more modern, and less biased in favour of ship-operators. Although the Hamburg Rules were readily adopted by developing countries, they were shunned by richer countries who stuck with Hague and Hague-Visby. It had been expected that a Hague/Hamburg compromise might arise, but instead the more extensive

Rotterdam Rules The "Rotterdam Rules" (formally, the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Carriage of Goods Wholly or Partly by Sea) is a treaty proposing new international rules to revise the legal framework for maritime affreightment ...

appeared.

Relation with other conventions

Article 31 of the Hamburg Convention covers its entry into force, coupled to denunciation of other Rules. Within five years after entry into force of the Hamburg Rules, ratifying states must denounce earlier conventions, specifically the Hague and Hague-Visby Rules. A long-standing aim has been to have a uniform set of rules to govern carriage of goods, but there are now five different sets: Hague, Hague-Visby, Hague-Visby/SDR, Hamburg and Rotterdam. (The Rotterdam Rules are not yet in force).Maritime Law Evolving - 2013 - ed. Malcolm Clarke

Ratifications

As of March 2021, the convention had been ratified by 35 countries:

References

External links

Convention textRatifications and signatures
Admiralty law treaties United Nations treaties Treaties concluded in 1978 Treaties entered into force in 1992 International transport Treaties of Albania Treaties of Austria Treaties of Barbados Treaties of Botswana Treaties of Burkina Faso Treaties of Burundi Treaties of Cameroon Treaties of Chile Treaties of the Czech Republic Treaties of the Dominican Republic Treaties of Egypt Treaties of the Gambia Treaties of Georgia (country) Treaties of Guinea Treaties of the Hungarian People's Republic Treaties of Jordan Treaties of Kazakhstan Treaties of Kenya Treaties of Lebanon Treaties of Lesotho Treaties of Liberia Treaties of Malawi Treaties of Morocco Treaties of Nigeria Treaties of Paraguay Treaties of Peru Treaties of the Socialist Republic of Romania Treaties of Senegal Treaties of Sierra Leone Treaties of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Treaties of Syria Treaties of Tunisia Treaties of Uganda Treaties of Tanzania Treaties of Zambia 1978 in West Germany 1978 in New York City {{International-law-stub de:Haager Regeln#Weitere Entwicklung (Hamburg- und Rotterdam-Regeln)