WHY should it be such a matter of mirth, or even surprise, that the government of that great landlocked republic of Mongolia should have decided to sponsor a ship register?

If we accept the statement that there is scarcely a man or woman inhabiting this earth whose lives are not affected in some beneficial way by the activities of merchant ships, a lack of proximity to salt water should not be an issue which should disqualify any sovereign state from wishing to fly its flag aboard ships which proclaim their nationality.

Let us face it, no one can get on their high horse, or even a hairy Mongolian pony, over this issue. Intelligent people actually reside in Mongolia, which is more than you can say for Kergeulen, which serves as France's great escape from reality in the flag state stakes.

It is a peaceful, ordered country, which is more than some important flag states can say about their own domestic situation. As they have been in the registry game for less than a fortnight, it is still too early to suggest that their maritime administration is corrupt or incompetent, as are numerous existing flag states which afford a regulatory refuge to hundreds of ships.

Look on the bright side. Ulan Bator could be the port of registry which, 10 years from now, could be symptomatic of all that is desired in maritime excellence, its name emblazoned on a thousand transoms.

We cannot discourage sovereign states, which see opportunities demonstrated elsewhere, from wishing to establish their own open registers.

It is not like the nuclear non-proliferation pact, which ensures that weapons capable of blowing our world clean in two should be solely in the hands of those who, er, can be, sort of, relied upon to be responsible.

Operating a flag state is not like having a space programme or taking a global lead in genetic modification of foodstuffs.

It is basically all about following a relatively small number of international conventions and ensuring that their prescriptions, translated into domestic law, are complied with by the ships flying the flag.

It is low technology, not rocket science.

It is an opportunity that might resound to the credit of the Mongolian administration, bring a bit of variety to the national occupation of nomadic sheepherding and provide a range of infrastructural employment to those hardy folk ranging the vast steppes and deserts.

It makes easily as much sense in our curious maritime market place as establishing a futures market for ships, betting on bunkers or half of these dubious e-business and financial "products" and opportunities doing the rounds.

Hope springs eternal, and at the present stage there is no particular reason to suppose that the Mongolian flag will be notably less effective than some of the appallingly incompetent administrations that are in the business of ship registry.

Mongolia hopes to be an open register, welcoming all comers and, while there are certain dogmatic folk who will condemn all flags of convenience as devices of the devil, this is palpable nonsense as there are plenty of national registers that set alarm bells ringing in port state control offices whenever their ships heave over the horizon, and flags of conveniences which are benchmarks of excellence.

At long last there is some movement taking place on the issue of flag state quality, and in a number of different areas.

There is still a mite too much political correctness in this arena, with a marked reluctance to use undiplomatic language to describe flag states that could not administer a small boating pond. But times are changing.

The International Maritime Organisation, for a start, has advanced beyond the cautious first steps of flag state implementation towards a model audit scheme.

Developed from the regime which has operated under the International Civil Aviation Organisation for six years the scheme, still under discussion, could provide a voluntary system of oversight and advice to help in hauling implementation laggards up by their bootstraps.

There are other pressures, not least from port state inspection systems which look at the flag of a ship as an"early warning"of a vessel which probably requires a closer look.

The US Coast Guard matrix firmly categorises the world flag states for their quality record and reacts accordingly. So does the Paris Memorandum of Understanding on Port State Control, which has no hesitation about labelling flags under black, grey or white categories depending on their record of detentions.

The corollary to this is that good shipowners who, for whatever perverse reasons, have insisted on using these registers despite their obvious incompetence may feel sufficiently harassed into looking for something rather better, hitting these raffish registers where it hurts most.

Classification societies, which have been criticised for their willingness to provide the technical facilities for flags which have limited in-house administrative expertise, are now clamping down on those flags which resolutely refuse to improve and chucking out the incorrigible.

But, entirely positively, the International Association of Classification Societies has launched an initiative to provide technical assistance to failing flags that are, in contrast, interested in self- improvement.

The "model instructions for enhancement of the control of statutory safety standards by flag states" provide a mechanism by which the sinner can repent.

The point is that, like the IMO's own technical assistance programme, the IACS model provides a system by which the willing can become acceptable, fully compliant, and does not pander to the belief that there should be some sort of halfway house for third world countries which find difficulty in understanding, let alone implementing, all the regulatory improvements that emerge from the IMO.

So Mongolia might thus be welcomed to this great ship register bazaar, assuming that it determines that it will live up to its convention obligations, taking advantage of what assistance it finds necessary to bring it up to speed.

It might be inconvenient to have one's marine administration located in a yurt, constantly moving around to wherever the grass is greener. But, in these days of electronic communication, everything, we are told, is possible.