Flag switching continues to beset ship recycling standards

The practice of changing a ship’s flag shortly before it is recycled continues to undermine EU efforts to improve environmental and social standards in the industry.

As assessment by the European Commission of its Ship Recycling Regulation concludes it has largely achieved its objectives and is seen as an important benchmark used by stakeholders and authorities within and outside the EU.

‘However, its effectiveness has been significantly undermined through the practice of shipowners changing the ship’s flag from a Member State’s flag to a non-EU flag shortly before being recycled, incentivised by the additional revenue from selling end-of-life vessels to South Asian yards,’ according to the EC media website.

Inadequate inventories

The evaluation also highlights that inventories of hazardous materials on a ship are often absent during the vessel’s operational life and ‘at the recycling stage, the quality of inventories is often insufficient’.  

European ship owners possess around 30% of the world’s fleet in tonnage. Many ships are dismantled outside the EU, mainly in South Asia, under conditions that are considered harmful to workers’ health and the environment.

New Convention

The assessment comes ahead of the Hong Kong Convention coming into force in June. According to EC, some areas of the new regime have standards that are less stringent than its own ship recycling regulation. ‘The Commission plans to assess how this Convention will be implemented and possibly improved towards stricter global standards.’  

The EC has also published its latest list of European ship recycling facilities. A yard in the Netherlands and one in Türkiye have been added, while three in Latvia, Lithuania, and Türkiye have been removed. The list now contains 43 facilities: 31 yards in Europe, 11 in Türkiye, and one in the United States.