Hong Kong: The Hong Kong Shipowners Association (HKSOA) is holding a special lecture on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) following its agm at the Island Shangri-La Hotel on November 24. Speakers will include Intertanko md Peter Swift and Shalini Mahtani, founder and ceo of HK-based charity Community Businer, an active proponent of CSR.
CSR is a topic of growing interest in shipping circles, particularly in Asia where the major Japanese groups have been to the fore. Defining its full scope will be one subject of the HKSOA lecture but environmental concerns are clearly key.
The HKSOA has already nailed its colours to the mast on the need for cleaner shipping. At a Green Ship Technology Asia Conference in Hong Kong last week, md Arthur Bowring opened the conference with a call for the industry to step forward with more advanced ideas for reducing pollution from ships.
Previously HKSOA itself had proposed a global cap of 1% on sulphur content on marine fuels, but following doubts from refiners as to the practicality of such a scheme it has now swung its support behind an Intertanko proposal to reduce emissions from ships by using distillate fuels in the future.
The timing of such moves coincides with international lobbying efforts to pressure the shipping industry to switch to cleaner fuels. A delegation of international, EU and US environmental organisations, formally represented at the IMO by Friends of the Earth International, seek to put air pollution controls on both new and existing ship engines that will drastically reduce smog-forming emissions and soot from diesel ship exhaust. [17/11/06]
Copyright © 2024. All rights reserved. Seatrade, a trading name of Informa Markets (UK) Limited. Add Seatrade Maritime News to your Google News feed.
