The Cyprus Shipping Chamber welcomes and fully supports the proposal by the International Chamber of Shipping to introduce a global CO2 reduction fund to the IMO. The Chamber believes that the earliest introduction of a global fund will help the industry drive towards achieving the IMO’s decarbonisation goals and ensure a global level playing field for the shipping industry.

The Chamber participates in the ICS working group on the development of a Market Based Mechanism that will raise funds through a flat rate contribution by ships per tonne CO2 emitted. The funds to be raised should inter alia be used to incentivize the uptake of low/net zero emission fuels by narrowing the price gap between these fuels and conventional liquid fuels and thus catalyzing the adoption of alternative fuels, funding for applied research and development (R&D) programmes of alternative fuels and innovative technologies and fund capacity building and negative impact mitigation in developing countries. Furthermore the proposed mechanism will add no additional burden on Maritime Administrations as it will be implemented through the existing IMO Data Collection System (DCS).

The Chamber believes that this ICS proposal balances all the concerns expressed so far by the IMO Member States and can form an excellent framework for further development and finalization by the IMO of a Market Based Mechanism for shipping as early as 2025.