The Amendment To Chapter IV’s Related Content Of “Maritime Law”

“People’s Republic of China Maritime Law”(hereinafter referred to as “Maritime Law”), which has been implemented in China since 1993, can be described as a successful, modern and unique law. However, with the change of global situation, the advent of new convention for maritime cargo transport promotes China’s “Maritime Law” to make a corresponding response. According to the development trend of China’s economy, the “maritime law” can’t better promote and facilitate the rapid and sustainable development of China’s import and export goods trade and the shipping industry in the future. It has become a core problem to discuss the amendment to “maritime law” for the academic study of maritime law in China. Especially for the core issue of “maritime law”, the relevant provision of contracts for carriage of goods by sea has even been a hot academic discussion.Before the specific system and provisions are discussed with the purpose of amendment to the law, it should be explicit about the following guiding ideologies. Firstly, the “maritime law” as the municipal law has its special history, legal environment and institutional content so that it can be containd by the civil law to be a special code. Secondly, it is expected that what social effects can the modified maritime law bring, which should be the starting point “maritime law”, namely the establishment of legislative objectives. According to China’s current status of economic development among the world’s import and export trade superpower, it concluded that, in terms of the protection involved in carriage of goods by sea, the protection for the interests of China’s cargo should be the main interest selection and side focus of the amendment to “maritime law” in China. At the same time, it also has to take the maintenance of the healthy development of China’s shipping industry into account. Thirdly, what the logic ideas that “maritime law” needed can ensure that the amendment to law is rightly to achieve legislative goals. The correct ideas should be following: Firstly, we should recognize what deviations and vulnerabilities exist in Chapter IV’s adjustment to shipping practice of China’s “maritime law”. Secondly, “the Rotterdam Convention” as a recent new international convention certainly will exert a huge impact on the amendment to law under the premise of absence, and its related content can provide new ideas for China’s amendment to law. Finally, on the basis of the development state of carriage of goods by sea, whether the relevant provisions of “Rotterdam Rules” are the legislative goals of China’s amendment to law, as well as what specific methods will be adopted to amend the law in order to guarantee the balance for protecting the interest of the goods.This paper centers around the related content of maritime law Chapter IV, “contracts for carriage of goods by sea” to conduct a legal research. In accordance with the provisions and orders of Chapter IV, the general provisions are applicable to the whole Chapter. Firstly, the adjustment range is lack of coastwise carriage in the fourth chapter of China’s “maritime law”, in practice, the implementation of “dual track system” of both the coastwise carriage and maritime transport has created some obstacles to the overall development of China’s shipping industry, and it should be included into the provisions of Chapter IV. The applicable scope of “maritime+other” regulated by “Rotterdam Rules” will be included into the range of discussion while proposing to expand the applicable scope, however, considering the cost and difficulties for the amendment to law, it will not consider the “seismic” amendment program with respect to the “maritime law”. In addition, in the respect of term meaning of the whole chapter, it should change the specified China’s “actual carrier” into the “maritime performing party” that has been defined in “Rotterdam Rules”. During the carrier’s period of responsibility, the person who are subjected to the requirements and involved in the carriage were all included into the provisions of Chapter IV, which is a win-win protection for cargo interests of both sides. In addition, it should add the definition of “transport document” and “electronic transport record” and so on.Carrier’s responsibility as the core content in the carriage of goods by sea should intensively reflect the balance of interests of both cargoes. In the regulation of responsibility period of the carrier, it is recommended that the carrier’s responsibility period should be united with the period of carriage contract, in order to protect the interests of cargo in the “non-containerized transport” within the operation of the port area and land, but allowing both parties’ contract conventions to reduce the responsibility period into “from load to discharge” so as to adapt the shipping practice operation and balance the interests of the ship. In terms of the carrier’s burden of proof in the responsibility basis, the amendment to law can refer to the provisions of the 17 th Act of “Rotterdam Rules”, and enhances systemic and operational property of burden of proof. Besides, it should determines the carrier’s principle of constructive fault or negligence in order to protect the equity interests owned by the claimant based on the real state of proving the carrier’s faults. It suggests that the elimination of particulars of “fault of navigation of the ship immunity” and “Fire Immunity” is a selection based on the objective development condition of the shipping as well as the consideration to the promotion of development towards the powerful shipping countries in China.The provisions to shipper isn’t the part which is mainly emphasized in the traditional maritime law. However, the “Rotterdam Rules” have increased the focus extent on their interests, which also represents a kind of times trend of the law. In particular, the new concept of “documentary shipper” is defined in public convention. However, the “documentary shipper” arrangement of “Rotterdam Rules” should not be adopted in China’s amendment to law, but we should distinguish the shipper who signs a contract of carriage by carrier from the one who delivers the goods to the carrier in order to solve the difficult situation where the carrier issues a transport document or electronic transport record. However, it can refer to the “Rotterdam Rules” and make a detailed provisions of shipper’s obligations to avoid the unnecessary risks that brought to both parties in practice.The amendment to the terms of transport documents in China’s “maritime law” Chapter IV mainly focuses on the “delivering goods without bills of lading” regulations and electronic transport record. China’s “maritime law” has regulated that carrier should strictly abide by the obligation of the delivering goods with bills of lading, it should continue to adhere to the principle of delivering goods with bills of lading when amending the law. Only through promoting the widespread use of electronic documents can we gradually and fundamentally ease the pressure brought by “delivering goods without bills of lading”. Although the popularity of electronic transport record still needs to take some time, the electronic transport record should be introduced into the Chapter IV of China’s “maritime law”. Also, it should provide the use regulation and the legal effect affirmation of related links of electronic transport documents.The section 7 of “maritime law” Chapter IV has regulated that the voyage charter party shall be included into the Chapter VI charter partie. We cannot ignore its another property as the charter partie because there exists some similarities between the voyage charter party and contracts for carriage of goods by Sea in the practice of certain places. In addition, based on the complexity of the multimodal transport contracts and the trend of rapid development of multimodal transport, the multimodal transport contracts in section 8 should be removed from the fourth chapter, and place it after the Chapter IV and be formulated solely into a chapter.