10 October 2015

Denmark to present Hong Kong Convention road map early 2016:

The Danish government will present a road map regarding the IMO's Hong Kong Convention that concerns ship recycling early next year, said Berit Hallam, deputy head of division at the Danish Ministry of Environment and Food.

A number of issues need to be clarified before the government can go ahead with the ratification of the Convention, she told a conference that is part of Danish Maritime Days. These include bringing the Danish regulations in line with the latest relevant European Union regulations and making sure that there would not be unnecessary regulation.

Of the ships that are recycled 60% are beached. "It is not good that only a few countries have ratified the Hong Kong Convention - and I am not proud over the fact that Denmark hasn't ratified it yet," said Anne H Steffensen, director general of the Danish Shipowners' Association, who spoke at the same event.

Ingvild Jensen, founder of the Shipbreaking Platform NGO, said Norwegian Shipowners' Association (NSA) had done good work by discouraging its members from using beaching as a method to recycle ships. She urged their Danish counterpart to team up with the Norwegians to work in the European Community Shipowners' Association (ECSA) to promote the NSA protocol, but instead of discouraging the use of beaching, they should urge European owners to only use yards listed by the European Commission as acceptable in terms of environmental and working conditions.

Source: HIS Maritime. 05 October 2015

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