**2. Relevance and importance of the environment of maritime transport and shipping IN management of the spread of Covid-19**

The Nigeria center for disease control [7, 8] notes that the index case of Covid-19 disease in Nigeria was an Italian Citizen who arrived Lagos after being possibly infected the virus in his home Country, Italy. This evidences the roles of the overall transport industry inclusive of the aviation, road, water/maritime transportation, rail, etc. in the spread of the disease and thus formed the overall reason for the ban of

### *Harnessing the Environment of Maritime Transport and Port Logistics Sector… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.101587*

international, regional and interstate travels as a combative measure against the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. Since transport facilitates social political and economic interaction between and among diverse geographical locations, residential settlements and work/industrial zones, it has inherent potential to negate the social distancing rules if not deliberately strategized to ensure the observance of social distancing rules. As an industry with capacity to mobilize mass movement of people and goods across spatial locations, the build environment of the maritime transport sector is a major relevant stakeholder in the fight against the transmission and spread of the Covid-19 disease. As such, for the continued operation of this important sector, sector specific cum institution specific, policies, regulations, strategies and guidelines must be developed in line with the general guidelines and rules of the World Health Organization and the Nationals guidelines for the prevention of the spread of Covid-19. The maritime transport industry like the aviation and road transport subsectors, similar to the health institutions need to be viewed as front line sectors that are directly affected by the pandemic, directly involved in the spread of the disease from one region to another and to residential settlements. As such, the environment of transport (including maritime transport) is relevantly involved and must play frontline roles in the management of the transmission of Covid-19 in the society. As a core component of the work and/or industrial zone with interactive relations with diverse urban and sub-urban residential settlements, the built environment of maritime transport can significantly contribute in breaking the curve of transmission of the disease to the benefit of society. The relevance and importance of the environment of maritime transport in the fight against the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic is better understood by observing the overlapping nature of interaction between and among different forms of built environment consisting of the work/industrial environment, residential environment, social environment, and religious environment as shown in **Figure 7**. The tick blue areas indicate areas of intersections and union

#### **Figure 7.**

*Spatial interaction model depicting the relevance and importance of the environment of maritime transport and other spatial settlements in the management of Covid-19. Source: Nwokedi [3].*

#### *Logistics Engineering*

between and among the environments. Thus, it behooves on all environment types to be actively involved in the implementation of the measures aimed at preventing the spread of the virus. Otherwise, gain made in other environments by strict and active implementation of the guidelines may be eroded be interacting sections such that the overall built environment will be re-infected through one section of the system.
