<P> The first Merchant Mariner Credential was issued on May 7, 2009, at a meeting of the Towing Safety Advisory Committee . </P> <P> The new credential has been criticized by several groups . One organization says that the consolidation reduces the merchant marine officer license, a certificate of professional achievement and status, into a work permit . Another group suggests that the consolidation, together with STCW requirements, the coming TWIC requirement, and new physical evaluation standards, have stressed the skilled labor pool, pose too much of an administrative burden, and threaten mariner recruitment, training and retention . </P> <P> The MMC is in the format of a traditional passport book . Like a passport, the cover is imprinted with the Great Seal of the United States and the text United States of America . Unlike a passport, the cover is red - maroon in color (rather than the four colors used for US passports or travel documents: dark blue, black, brown, and blue - green) and the text Merchant Mariner Credential appears in place of Passport . Also, the cover does not hold a contactless smart card chip as do newer biometric passports (ePassport). </P> <P> The MMC has twenty pages, exclusive of the front and back covers, sequentially numbered like the visa pages of a passport . Basic identity document data is page 3 . The MMC is not a passport, but it is a Seafarer's Identity Document and the format of the data page complies with the ICAO Machine Readable Travel Documents specifications for machine - readable passports . Rather than the document type of P used with US government issued passports, a document type of PG is used for MMCs . </P>

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