The cost of private security and greater fuel costs from sailing at higher speeds made up more than half the overall cost, the report said. Other expenditures entailed maintaining permanent naval forces to combat piracy in the Indian Ocean as well as re-routing such forces.

Greater use of armed guards, marginally improved law and order in onshore Somalia, more prosecutions of pirates and increasingly aggressive naval action are all credited with bringing about a drastic reduction in attacks.

According to EU NAVFOR, the European Union naval task force that is one of several military forces patrolling the Indian Ocean, there were only 36 confirmed pirate attacks in 2012 compared to 176 the previous year. Only five ships were captured, down from 25 in 2011 and 27 in 2010.

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