Torben Skaanild cuts a competitive figure on the golf course. While the club may not point to the flag as much as he may like on the backswing, he can certainly give the ball a good tonk and his putter has a tendency to glow white hot when needed. And when it comes to battling it out on the fairways, he is up there with the best. Maybe being one step ahead is a pre-requisite of being Secretary General at BIMCO, but as he admits himself, having a good team around you is just as important. You need people to buy into your plans especially in an industry that he freely admits he loves and will do anything to defend.
He has had a long and very international career within the shipping industry, having held executive positions in Canada, The Philippines, Thailand and Hong Kong, China, before returning to Denmark to join BIMCO in 1981 as Deputy Secretary General. In 1984 he was appointed Secretary General of BIMCO, but left in 1991 to join Dr Helmut Sohmen and the World-Wide Shipping Group (now BW Group), Hong Kong, China, as a Director. His academic qualifications were obtained through The East Asiatic Co.(EAC) and its traditional commercial training programme in Business Administration, complemented with studies at the University of British Columbia/British Columbia Institute of Technology (Canada) and the Columbia University Graduate School of Business (USA).
On his return from Hong Kong, he founded Skaanild & Partners, engaging in various advisory and investment projects including the turn-around and restructuring of small to medium-sized companies. He was also involved with several companies at board level, among others as Chairman of the Board of Dynatest International A/S and associated companies.
In 2008, he returned to BIMCO in his old position as Secretary General, and Chairman of the Board of BIMCO Informatique. Externally of BIMCO he is the proprietor of Skaanild & Partners ApS and manages its investment portfolio while his non-executive positions include being a member of the board of Latin America Snack Company Ltd and a member of the IACS Board of Appeal. He is an active member and Past President of Rotary and has held various honorary positions including that of Vice-consul of Denmark. He was decorated with the title: “Commendatore of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Italy” by the President of the Republic of Italy on 2 June 1991 and was appointed Chairman of the Executive Board of the World Maritime University in February of last year.
“I returned to BIMCO in March 2008 and people asked me how I saw the industry; was it any different? And largely it really isn’t. We were still not aware at that time that we were facing a major financial crisis that hit us along with a lot of other issues such as a very large environmental agenda. So in some respects the industry has changed tremendously; it has become much more about a wider range of issues that we need to tackle, rightly or wrongly.
“I still believe that some of the new regulatory initiatives have been conquered by the environmentalists; these initiatives have been prompted out of ignorance and that is a sad thing. And a question that was asked of me when I came back was did I still believe in what I said in 1991, that if we don’t try to deal more effectively with shipping’s lack of image, we will continue to be faced with very bad legislation and over-reactions from politicians when we have accidents at sea. And we will continue to have accidents. But the public and politicians don’t see those accidents in perspective of the volume of cargo that is being carried by many ships at sea every day. So it has been an interesting four years so far,” he said.
