(www.MaritimeCyprus.com) When ships reach the end of their operational life, they are normally dismantled for scrap in a practice that is referred to as "ship recycling". The majority of global ship recycling takes place in South Asia (India, Bangladesh and Pakistan) as well as in Turkey.
Ships are structurally complex and their dismantling can generate various environmental, safety and health hazards. As a result, there are international regulations in place which aim to ensure that the hazards of ship recycling are managed. In 2013 the EU adopted the EU Ship Recycling Regulation (EU SRR) which has been applicable to ships in scope since 31 December 2018.
Meanwhile, the IMO Hong Kong Convention (HKC) entered into force on 26 June 2025 following its adoption in 2009, also regulating the issue of ship recycling.
Aim of the report
The objective of this report is to identify and analyse key areas where the HKC and the EU SRR diverge. To do this, the report examines the legal texts of both frameworks, together with the corresponding IMO and EU guidelines and secondary legislation. Several recommendations to narrow the gaps between the frameworks are also given. The national implementations of the EU SRR and HKC as well as guidelines from other bodies such as the ILO are out of scope of this report.
Main findings
Since the EU SRR was based on the HKC, the two frameworks share many of the same principles, concepts and structures. However, there are also important differences, especially in the requirements for ship recycling facilities, while the rules for ships are generally more closely aligned.
An important difference between the two frameworks is the process through which ship recycling facilities are authorised. A key feature of the EU SRR is the “European List of Ship Recycling Facilities” where EU-flagged ships must be recycled. The EU SRR establishes two processes for facilities to be added to this list, with the process for facilities located outside the EU (and EEA countries) being comparatively more extensive.
Notably, applicant facilities from third countries, where the majority of the word’s ship recycling takes place, must first gain an independent certification attesting adherence to the EU SRR requirements, then make an application to the European Commission to evidence how the individual requirements of the Regulation are met. Thereafter, facilities are subject to an assessment and inspections on behalf of the European Commission. Specific technical guidelines have also been developed to clarify and substantiate many of the requirements of the EU SRR for third country facilities. Once facilities are approved, mid-term inspections take place, and these, together with the initial inspection reports, are made publicly available.
The HKC also requires parties to the Convention to establish a mechanism for authorising ship recycling facilities to ensure they meet the requirements of the Convention. The mechanism should, according to the Convention, include inspection, monitoring and enforcement provisions. However, individual countries determine the exact details of what the mechanism entails and they are not required to share this mechanism with the IMO. This means there is no standardised approach to how ship recycling facilities apply for HKC authorisation, the specific standards they are inspected against or the conditions for their continued authorisation.
Related to this, an important feature of the HKC is that it frequently refers to guidelines to clarify or elaborate on certain requirements instead of giving specifics directly in the legal text of the HKC. For example, important elements about infrastructure and drainage at ship recycling facilities, the details of environmental and safety management systems and specifics about audit schemes for authorised facilities are elaborated only in guidelines and not in the HKC itself. Where Parties require full adherence to the relevant guidelines before granting or renewing HKC authorisation to a ship recycling facility, the gaps between the HKC and the EU SRR are narrower.
Nevertheless
However the degree to which the guidelines are actually applied in practice by each of the entities authorising ship recycling facilities around the world is uncertain. Related to this, the HKC permits the authorisation of ship recycling facilities to be delegated to external organisations without defining the necessary experience or qualifications these organisations should have.
Gaps between the HKC and the EU SRR also exist due to the legal text of the EU SRR setting more specific requirements, for instance on the control of waste leakage during the ship recycling process. The EU SRR is likewise more specific in requiring that downstream waste management takes place according to standards that are “broadly equivalent” to EU and international standards which are defined in supplementary technical guidance and to which adherence is assessed via the mandatory inspections for third country facilities. While the HKC does require that wastes from ship recycling are transferred only to a waste management facility authorised to deal with their treatment and disposal, the standard on which authorisation is based on is not defined in the HKC. Instead, guidelines refer to national standards for downstream waste management while international standards, which are not defined, should be "taken into account".
Gaps
The gaps between the EU SRR and HKC with respect to ships are more limited, although a significant gap in the HKC is the narrower scope of the Inventory of Hazardous Materials which is required to be compiled during a ship’s operational life and ahead of recycling. This is important because the inventory prepared by the shipowner/manager is used by ship recycling facilities to plan how the type and amount of hazardous materials on board the ship will be managed during the recycling process. There is no obligation for ship recycling facilities to carry out additional sampling of hazardous materials prior to recycling operations.
As such, a narrower range of inventorised hazardous materials provides less assurance as to the presence of hazardous materials, putting ship recycling facility workers and the surrounding area at greater risk. Other identified gaps in the HKC, compared with the EU SRR, include less specific transparency requirements such as information about the method of recycling used at authorised facilities. The EU SRR also provides a much more direct mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns about possible breaches of the Regulation. At the time of writing, however, the IMO was still developing further means of information dissemination under the HKC, including a dedicated module on an existing IMO information platform.
Recommendations
Compared to the EU SRR, the HKC has the advantage of applying across a far wider scope, covering more ships and ship recycling facilities. This broader reach is a major strength, as it increases the potential impact of stronger social, human and environmental protection. However, the HKC’s presently more flexible and less specific requirements offer less protection against uneven implementation. In that sense, making the HKC’s requirements more specific and consistent could better ensure safe and environmentally sound recycling of ships worldwide. The following recommendations are highlighted in particular:
- Authorisation mechanisms for ship recycling facilities: Communication of the mechanism HKC Parties establish to authorise ship recycling facilities, including the specific criteria which the Party considers mandatory and the form and frequency of facility inspections. Clearer rules are also recommended on the types of organisations that may be delegated responsibility for authorising ship recycling facilities, and on their qualifications.
- Downstream waste management standards: Specify which international standards for downstream waste management are applicable under the HKC and require Parties to communicate which standards they consider mandatory when authorising facilities.
- Scope of the Inventory of Hazardous Materials (IHM): Update the IHM materials of the HKC to be consistent with the higher number of materials under the EU SRR.
For more details, download the Gap analysis of the Hong Kong Convention and EU Ship Recycling Regulation, below:
Source: ECSA
