ASSESSMENT OF THE ACTIVITY TO STOP A DECLINE IN THE NUMBER OF SEAFARERS IN THE EUROPEAN UNION - THE CASE OF POLAND

Sa？etak Shipping is, unquestionably, one of the most important determinants of efficient functioning of the contemporary world economy. It is the basis of maritime economy, the significance of which increases with the development of technology. New methods of exploring maritime resources and new opportunities of their use have caused that the European Union, inter alia, in the maritime economy has discovered possibilities to realise the Europe 2020 strategy. It has been confirmed by numerous initiatives on the levels of: union, macro region (i.e. Baltic Sea Region etc.), national. It turned out that the greatest weakness and threat in the achievement of the defined objectives is a decreasing number of European seafarers (especially officers). In this article the roots and the dimensions of that issue were described. The desk-research method as well as the pools method were used to find out the reasons which governed students’ choice study at Gdynia Maritime University. The results of investigation constituted the basis to evaluate the effectiveness of the actions aiming to increase interest in work at sea