In his closing speech at IMPA Athens 2026, BLU Maritime’s Commercial Manager, Aristotelis Moutafis, reminded the audience that, although most people in procurement will rarely, if ever, meet the crews they buy for, the decisions made ashore shape daily life on board: the quality of crews’ meals, their health, and how connected they feel to home during long months at sea.
This, he argued, is why the human side of procurement matters.
AI can help the industry decide faster and with better information, but it is up to people to make sure those decisions are also good ones, taking into account the human factor that AI cannot.
His bottom line was clear: use AI, and use it a lot, letting it bring the speed, while keeping people in the decision, because they bring the context, and at sea, context is what keeps the supply chain, and the crews who depend on it, moving.
He closed with a light touch, noting that the speech itself had been drafted by AI but delivered by a human.
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