Report on the 596th Meeting of the Board of Directors 30 November 2017 No.17-007 Download PDF (134KB) The 596 th Meeting of the Association’s Board of Directors was held in Tokyo on 30 November 2017 to review open policy years, decide on the 2018 renewal and adopt proposed alterations to the Rules of the Association. The decisions made thereon are set out in part II. I.  Introduction The world economy is growing solidly, and the shipping industry in general is also gradually recovering, but not across the board; some sectors are still in a difficult situation. In such circumstances, as at 20 October this year, we are pleased to report that the total number of vessels entered with our Association has been maintained at 4,345, across 93.92 million gross tons in the aggregate, thanks to the continued support of the Members of the Association. Turning to the claims received by the Association, the first half of the 2017 policy year saw a favourable claims trend for ocean-going vessels (mutual entries), continuing from last year. However, since the middle of this year, the loss record has worsened due to some large claims. On the other hand, the claims trend for coastal vessels (Naiko Class, fixed premium entries) has been positive,  better than last year’s. That said, close attention should be paid as the tendency of claims occurrence increases during the winter season in the Northern Hemisphere. Having considered various factors essential for the management of the Association in facing the continuously challenging P&I insurance market, such as our Members’ difficult business environment, ensuring the soundness of the Association’s income and expenditure and so on, the Board has reached the decisions set out in part II.1 below on advance call rates, supplementary calls and release calls for the 2018 policy year. II.  Main Decisions 1. Calls and Premiums (a) Owners’ Entries 1) 2018 Policy Year (i) Advance Call There will be no general increase in