The NGO Shipbreaking Platform has documented that in the last three years, 20 ships were sold by Evergreen, Korea Line, Precious Shipping and Thoresen Thai Agencies to beaching facilities in South Asia. The companies have been excluded from the GPFG because the beaching of their vessels cause severe environmental damage and serious human rights violations [2].

Whilst the exclusions so far are limited to companies that have sold their end-of-life vessels to be beached in Bangladesh and Pakistan, the reports clearly state that “to date, the Council on Ethics has not examined the way ships are broken up in India.” Many of the concerns raised by the Council also apply to the beaching practices in Alang, India. Indeed, as stated in their reports: “One particular problem with beaching is that shipbreaking takes place when the vessels are standing in mud and sand. As a result, the pollution leaches into the ground and is washed out with the tides. Even if arrangements were put in place at the beaching sites for the treatment of asbestos and PCBs, for example, the fundamental problem of containing and collecting the pollution would be impossible to resolve”. In light of this, the Platform encourages the Council on Ethics to also engage with companies that sell their ships for breaking on the beach of Alang, India.

According to the Council on Ethics, selling a vessel to a beaching yard “is a consequence of an active choice on the part of the company that owned the vessel to maximise its profit. In the Council’s opinion, that company must shoulder an independent responsibility for doing so. There are better ways of dismantling ships that are readily available to the shipowner, but these are more expensive”.

Bearing in mind that Taiwan used to be the destination for breaking ships before the boom of the industry in South Asia, it is particularly damning for Evergreen – a Taiwanese company – not to remember the legacy that the industry left in its country following the explosion in the port of Kaohsiung in 1988.