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(1) Where grain is loaded on board any ship, or is loaded at any port in Ghana on any ship, all necessary and reasonable precautions shall be taken to prevent the grain from shifting and if the precautions are not taken, the owner or the master or any agent of the owner who is responsible for the loading or with sending the ship to sea laden with the grain, commits an offence and the ship shall be considered for the purposes of this Act to be unsafe by reason of improper loading.

(2) Where any ship, loaded with grain outside Ghana without necessary and reasonable precautions having been taken to prevent the grain from shifting, enters any port in Ghana so laden, the owner or master commits an offence and the ship shall be considered for the purposes of this Act to be unsafe by reason of improper loading

(3) No offence is committed under subsection (2) where the ship would not have entered the port but for stress of weather or force majeure, which neither the master, the owner nor the charterer, if any, could have prevented or forestalled.

(4) Any person authorized by the Director-General to ensure the observance of the provisions of this section may inspect the grain and the mode in which it is stowed and shall have all the powers of a surveyor of ships under this Act.