Multi-Attribute Decision Making for Crew Nationality Pattern Selection in the Shipping Business: An Empirical Study for Turkish Shipping Case *

This paper investigates selection of crew nationality pattern strategy. Manning task is one of the most reported problems in shipping business. Increasing life quality of countries influences popularity of on board employments and its cost has crucial share in total terms. Although many shipping firms have preferred domestic crew, because of excess crew costs and some other reasons, multinational employment is prominent alternative. On the other hand, multi-national manning has its own specific difficulties such as common language on board. An analytic hierarchy process design is developed to answer this problem due to several factors. Alternatives are based on national, fully foreigners and a joint strategy for crew appointments. An empirical study is conducted for Turkish shipping case.