With freight volumes shrinking at Australia's biggest ports, the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) is encouraging members to take leave, including unpaid sabbaticals, to avoid incurring job culls.
The Port of Melbourne, Australia's biggest port, reported that its container traffic fell 16 percent in last month compared with the same time in 2008.
"People will be encouraged to take their long service leave; or if they've got large amounts of annual leave, we would be encouraging them to take that," MUA was quoted as saying by The Australian.
"There may be opportunities for people to take a sabbatical and take unpaid leave or part paid leave and take some time off."
Stevedoring company Patrick said it might be forced to lay off 100 workers as it looked for ways to cut back on capacity, and the MUA is hoping to stem job losses by reducing the number of workers at each shift.