The Asian Shipowners’ Forum (ASF) ship recycling committee noted the EU parliament had started to debate the introduction of a levy on ships of any flag calling at European ports to an fund the auditing of ship recycling and draw up a list of yards compliant with the EU regulation on shipbreaking. The “beaching method” of scrapping ships commonly used in the Indian sub-continent would be banned.
“ASF has a serious concern about the proposed funding mechanism to finance environmentally sound ship recycling under the terms of EU regulation and its application to the non-EU flag vessels,” said Yuichi Sonoda, secretary general of ASF.
ASF instead backs the Hong Kong International Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships, 2009 (Hong Kong Convention), which has yet to be ratified by the required number of IMO member states to come into force.
“The proposed EU Regulation could seriously undermine the Hong Kong Convention and its adoption could consequently lead to inadequate ship recycling capacity worldwide,” Sonoda warned.
Copyright © 2024. All rights reserved. Seatrade, a trading name of Informa Markets (UK) Limited. Add Seatrade Maritime News to your Google News feed.
