Sterling’s response regarding the chartered ships was a lie: a quick look into Maersk’s addendum to the charter contract is enough to understand that. First, Maersk explicitly asked the German owner through a clause in the contract to ensure the immediate demolition of the vessels in order to get them off the market. Second, Maersk demanded in another clause that the vessels had to be sold for the highest price available on the scrap market – without any consideration of environmental or social standards. With the latter clause, Maersk put pressure on the ship fund to sell the 14 vessels for a minimum price of 447 USD per ton, a price that corresponded at the time to the prices offered in South Asian beaching yards. No facility operating under safe and sound conditions would have been able to pay such a high price. Moreover, the contract between Maersk and MPC states that if MPC were to sell the vessels for a lower price, Maersk would have to pay the difference. And, crucially, if MPC managed to sell for a higher price, it was under an obligation to pay Maersk the difference in profit earned. The MPC case is likely not an isolated one. The Platform found that Maersk had sold another three older ships to Greek owner Danaos and immediately chartered them back on a long-term basis. Also these three vessels ended up in beaching yards.

After Maersk’s business tactics were revealed in the Danish press, the shipping line has received strong criticism for its unsustainable shipbreaking practices from Danish Parliamentarians, leading Danish environmental organisations, and its own investors.

Danwatch’s investigations at Maersk’s Shree Ram yard in Alang have shown severe shortcomings related to fundamental labour rights, environmental safeguards and basic health and safety standards. Maersk’s support of the beaching yards in Alang stalls any development in India to move ship recycling to modern industrial platforms. Such a transition was already supported by the Government of Gujarat and investors in the 1990s when the Pipavav dry dock was built in order to bring the Indian ship recycling industry to an acceptable level. However, the shipping industry’s profits on the beaches of Alang have consolidated the beaching yards’ monopoly in India, while innovative new businesses from India have been stifled.