Abstract:
1 Introduction
International trade is growing at such an alarming
rate that it is now globally indispensable.
According to Chua1
, no country in the world can
have any hope of economic prosperity without
being a part of the global trade. It is a true façade
of globalization where the whole world has
become a single market place in which people
are enjoying goods, products and services that
are being brought to their footsteps through
the use of international trade. In transporting
goods from one country to another, the mode
of carriage is key. Today, we see that carriage of
goods by sea is the most favored method of all
just as it was centuries ago as it allows a carrier
to transport a bulk of goods and products at a
minimum cost in comparison to other modes of
international transportation.
Paul Todd2 states that, carriage of goods by
sea can be initiated using two fundamental
methods which includes a charter party and
a bill of lading. However, these methods are
fundamentally different from one another in
several aspects as the charter party relates to
the ship itself, while the bill of lading relates to
the cargo aboard the ship. Wilson observes that
the bill of lading originated initially as a nonnegotiable receipt in the Fourteenth Century
where it was issued by the ship-owner to a
merchant who did not wish to take the journey.3
At the time, the document constituted details
relating to the description of the goods.
Subsequently, it also endorsed the terms of the
2 The Bar Association Law Journal 2020 Vol. XXV
contract of carriage to resolve any disputes that
may arise between the cargo owners and the
ship owners. Finally, in the Eighteenth Century,
the bill of lading was used to dispose of the
goods that were in transit by endorsing the bill
and surrendering it to another party who was
then able to demand the cargo upon arrival of
the vessel.
