Hague Agreement

Summary of Hague Agreement

The product of a 1924 conference on ocean carrier liability sponsored by the International Chamber of Commerce. The agreement embraced various defenses to carrier liability for loss or damage to cargo and established a limitation of liability at one hundred pounds sterling (approximately five hundred dollars at the time) per package or customary freight unit. The agreement has been adopted, with some modification, by most maritime countries, usually as a carriage of goods by sea act. The United States substantially adhered to the agreement by enactment of the U.S. Carriage Of Goods By Sea Act (read this and related legal terms for further details) of 1936, providing a carrier liability of five hundred dollars per package or customary freight unit. In 1967 a conference was convened in Belgium to update the Hague Agreement, including an increase in the carrier’s liability per package; the product of this conference, known as the Visby Amendment (read this and related legal terms for further details), has not entered into force.

See Hamburg Rules.

(Main Author: William J. Miller)