ESG Ship Vetting

Independent Ethical ESG Ship Vetting

Seafarer Welfare is a major human rights topic, and Ship Breaking is a major humans rights, safety and environmental topic in the global supply chain. Most of the goods we consume around the world are delivered by ships to our shores. Yet ESG and Sustainability Risk Management hasn’t traditionally addressed these problems.

Global Risk Management’s independent ESG Ship Vetting services are a global first, designed to help Importers, Exporters, Freight Forwarders and Financial Institutions understand and manage their ESG risks.

How We Support Our Clients

• Helping your team better understand the risks
• Supporting the development of Seafarer Welfare and Ship Breaking internal values and policy documents
• Reviewing Shipping Service Contracts
• Supply of Good Practice Contract Clauses/Support Contract Negotiations
• Conducting Shipping Service Procurement Due Diligence
• Conducting Vessel and Ship Recycling Yard Inspections and Contract Audits
• Supporting your relationship with your suppliers to help make ESG improvements
• ESG / Sustainability Reporting

Truly Independent

ESG Ship Vetting is unique. Very unique. As far as we know we are the only ESG focused ship vetting company in the world.  What’s more, as far as we know, we are the only completely independent ship vetting company that does not have conflicts of interest. We have no conflicts of interest because we do not provide services to the shipping industry.

Our Commitment to Our Clients

• We help our clients implement their ESG / Sustainability values, assure their stakeholders and protect their reputation,
• We will remain independent and non-conflicted. We give the most honest, unbiased, evidence based assessment possible, against existing good practice standards,
• We only work for non-shipping companies, such as importers, exporters, freight forwarders and finance companies, for the purpose of ESG / Sustainability Risk Management.

A Significant Humans Rights Issue At Sea

Our clients who in the past have considered Seafarer Welfare in their ESG /Sustainabilty risk assessments, typically assume that because the ships are certified to the international regulations, the issue of Seafarer Welfare is not a risk in their supply chain that needs special attention.

Unfortunately, despite

• The Maritime Labour Convention (MLC),
• The STCW – International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watch-keeping for Seafarers, and
• The Paris MOU,

…for thousands of seafarers, this assumption couldn’t be further from the truth.

Somehow, despite all the checks and balances, there is a very high level of human rights abuses currently occurring on the very vessels bringing our products to our shores all over the world.

The Cold Reality for Thousands of Seafarers

• Forced overtime,
• Little or no access to medical treatment,
• No shore leave in many ports around the world,
• Work/rest hours abuses
• Inadequate nutrition,
• Seafarers being lied to about when they will be allowed shore leave or even worse, when they get to fly home to their families,
• Not being paid for months at a time, if at all,
• Crews being forced to sign documents stating they are voluntarily staying at sea for a second 9 month voyage, despite this still being illegal,
• Internet turned off to prevent home and inter-ship communications as well as with labour unions, and
• Rape and Sexual Abuse of Seafarers.

Despite there being adequate rules and standards ‘on paper’ which are ‘enforced’ with regular industry audits and inspections, these humans rights abuses are growing in number every year.

Conflicts of Interest and Corruption

The problem is that there are too many conflicts of interest in the shipping industry. Classification Societies and Flag States, who want to attract ships into their portfolios to generate income, are also responsible for the majority of the inspections. The industry is largely self regulated and lacks transparency.

Furthermore, with the corruption seen across the industry, there is little hope for seafarer welfare standards improving across the industry unless something changes.

Until now, there has been no truly independent shipping vetting service that focuses on Seafarer Welfare, to be offered to importers conducting ESG / Sustainability risk assessments.

Until now…

A Significant Human Rights, Safety and Environmental Issue on Southeast Asian Beaches

If you look at the rules regarding the Ship Breaking, a company doing ESG / Sustainability risk assessments could easily assume, that on face value, this is not a risk area they need to invest time in.

The reality is, that every year around 1000 ships are scrapped with 65 to 75 % of them ending up on one of the three ship breaking beaches located in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The majority of these ship breaking yards have a mixture of appalling human rights, labour, safety and environmental standards.

Unfortunately, an importer or exporter can’t even rely on the fact that a vessel owner is an EU company covered by strict EU laws. Some of Europe’s largest most respected shipping companies knowingly ‘re-flag’ their vessels and dispose of them via ‘one ship’ shell companies to ‘Cash Buyers’, knowing their vessels end up on South Asia’s beaches.

Our research shows that, in both 2019 and 2020, one large ‘respected’ EU ship owner disposed of at least 4 ships each year in this manner. It also shows that a well known Asian shipping company who hit the headlines in 2021, disposed of at least 11 ships on these South Asia beaches in 2019 and another 7 ships in 2020. Even Chinese ship owners who have access to cleaner and safer ship breaking yards in China, dispose of their ships on these South Asian beaches to maximise profit.

This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Until now, there has been no truly independent shipping vetting service that offers importers, exporters and financial institutes conducting ESG / Sustainability risk assessments, specialist advice that helps you understand your risk of using individual services by:

• examining the evidence of your proposed shipper’s recent ship breaking practices,
• helping you understand the validity of their answers when you conduct due diligence during your procurement processes.

Until now…

See Further Information and Videos on Ship Breaking

Ship Breaking and the Oil Industry – Breaking Tankers, FPSO’s, Support Vessels and Oil Drilling Platforms