In the year since being formed at the COP26 climate change talks in Glasgow the Maritime Just Transition Task Force, set up to work out how to reskill the seafaring workforce for a digital and decarbonised future in safe and fair ways, has come some distance.

But launching a report which calculates up to 800,000 seafarers will need additional training by the mid-2030s to be able to handle alternative fuels and propulsion technologies at the COP27 meeting in Egypt, the group involving shipowners, unions and the United Nations stressed the hard work starts now.