Notwithstanding the adoption of the Ship Registration Act 58/1998 intended to render ship
registration in South Africa attractive to ship owners and bareboat charterers, no trading
ships are currently on the register, although as explained in section 4.3 that might be the
outcome of the globalisation of the production of commercial shipping rather than the fault of
the register. Indeed, the terms of the register were well conceived at the time of its
introduction and there little to criticise in its application as the primary ship register for South
Africa, bearing in mind that it also serves as the register for non-trading ships.