After first joining Maritime Magazine as Marketing and Business Development Director in 2003, I am delighted to have assumed the role of Publisher effective January 1, 2024, coinciding with the actual winter 2023-2024 edition.
This bilingual (English and French) quarterly publication, approaching its third decade, has become recognized as Canada’s media outlet of record for maritime/multimodal/ logistics stakeholders involved in the Canada-US Great Lakes/St. Lawrence waterway, North Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic trades.
I am proud to be supported by an outstanding team assembled by Editor Leo Ryan, who also joined Maritime Magazine in 2003 following a distinguished career that included Canada Bureau Chief of the New York Journal of Commerce, regular contributor to Lloyd’s List, and as a Paris-based foreign correspondent.
Our magazine’s dedicated journalistic, analytical impact internationally was incidentally underscored by special invitations for Maritime Magazine to be represented at major events this past fall staged by the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office and Business Finland. This was a great opportunity not to be missed for our Pacific Horizons columnist Colin Laughlan and Green Horizons columnist Julie Gedeon – as shown in their reports in the current issue.
From Casablanca to the St. Lawrence
Looking back briefly, you might say my love of ships began in Morocco, where I was born from parents who had fled Poland towards the end of the World War II. As a child, a favourite occupation was to wander around the docks of Casablanca – watching with fascination as naval ships especially from the Atlantic Alliance entered and departed from the beautiful port during the Cold War period. It was exciting to climb gingerly aboard at the encouragement of the captains and discover a unique universe.
Some years later, when my family emigrated to Montreal via a memorable passenger ship voyage to Halifax, little did I suspect that my professional future would eventually become closely linked to the commercial shipping world.
But after graduating in International Relations from Loyola University (became Concordia), my interpersonal, communications and organizational skills seemingly brought me on a journey that led to Canada’s maritime industry. For a number of years, I fulfilled key executive roles for the Quebec Insurance Brokers Corporation, often piloting conventions of up 1,000 people. Then, as a consultant, came what turned out to be a career-defining contract: the organization in Montreal in 2003 of the big centennial conference and gala dinner of the Shipping Federation of Canada.
Last word as we enter 2024: many observers see it as a daunting year of transition amidst global geopolitical turbulence. But not all economic indicators are negative – for our team, it’s steady as she goes…
Sophie Belina Brzozowska
