Lawmakers joined the industry's collective efforts to ease the dearth of cadetship berths in the country as they deliberate on the bill that seeks to provide the state-run Philippine Merchant Marine Academy (PMMA) a new charter that includes a provision for a training ship.

Before Congress took its Christmas break last month, the House of Representatives started deliberating on House Bill 10449, the substitute bill for House Bill 6439 originally authored by Cagayan De Oro Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, that seeks to declare PMMA as the National Maritime Academy.