It is a difficult moment for shipping decarbonisation. Geopolitical instability, shifting policy timelines, and delays to the International Maritime Organization ‘s (IMO) Net-Zero Framework have created an environment in which many companies have gone quiet on their climate commitments, caught between reputational risk and regulatory ambiguity. The pressure to deprioritise long-term agendas in favour of short-term certainty is real and understandable.

And yet, as Chair and Vice Chair of the Sea Cargo Charter (SCC), we find ourselves more convinced than ever that stepping back right now would be a mistake that our industry as a whole, and individual companies, will come to regret. The underlying reality has not changed: the maritime industry must decarbonise. The companies building data systems, internal capabilities, governance structures, and disclosure practices today will be far better positioned when regulatory requirements tighten. And they will tighten, even if the timeline has shifted.

What the Sea Cargo Charter was built for

SCC was founded in 2020 to give charterers and shipowners a consistent, credible framework for tracking and transparently reporting the alignment of their chartering activities with the IMO’s decarbonisation trajectories. Six years on, the framework is more relevant than ever, not because the regulatory environment has delivered clarity, but precisely because it has not.
In the absence of effective and predictable regulations, credible voluntary frameworks fill a critical gap. They give companies rigorous and comparable data to evaluate vessels and negotiate terms at the point of fixture as well as substantiate performance claims. They also give companies the actionable data to evaluate and capture ‘low-hanging fruit’ in daily operations by accurately measuring the impact of various operational and energy-efficiency initiatives. We believe charterers and shipowners who fail to act miss the opportunity to develop the capabilities and organisational learning required for smart, cost-efficient decarbonisation and risk being unprepared as regulatory requirements tighten.

What gives us confidence

What gives us genuine confidence as SCC leaders is what we observe from our signatories. In our most recent annual disclosure report, signatories reported on average over 90% of their eligible portfolio emissions, a level of commitment to transparent disclosure that speaks for itself. This coalition spans more than 30 shipowners and charterers across four continents, representing sectors as diverse as agriculture, chemicals, oil and gas, metals, and trading. It includes names such as ADM , Cargill , Equinor , Maersk Tankers , and TotalEnergies . This is not a narrow grouping of like-minded actors; it is a broad cross-section of the industry, collectively choosing to be accountable.

In an environment where an increasing number of organisations are choosing silence, that says something important.

Among our signatories, emissions alignment has increasingly become a management tool, not merely a reporting obligation. They are using the SCC framework to build internal competency, allow for more substantive conversations with shipping partners, identify where operational improvements can be made, and drive behavioral change across their supply chains. Our experience-sharing forums (covering topics from biofuels to wind-assisted propulsion) create a pre-competitive environment in which signatories learn from one another and accelerate progress together.

Transparency as a signal of leadership

There is a tendency in uncertain times to treat transparency as a burden—something to be managed, minimised, or deferred. We would argue the opposite. Transparency is a signal of leadership and long-term credibility. The companies shaping the narrative proactively, rather than adopting a ‘wait and see’ approach to regulation, are the ones building trust with customers, investors, and partners. That trust is difficult to manufacture retrospectively.

Our fifth Annual Disclosure Report will be published in June, and for the first time it will give particular emphasis to the concrete experiences and achievements of our signatories. We hope it serves not only as a record of progress but as a demonstration of what active participation in SCC makes possible operationally, commercially, and reputationally.

Shipping’s decarbonisation is not a problem any single actor can solve. It requires courage and collaboration across the value chain, between charterers and shipowners, between competitors, and across geographies. The Sea Cargo Charter exists to support exactly that kind of leadership. Regulatory certainty will come. The question is whether your organisation will be ready for it.

Join us

If your organisation is involved in chartering or shipping activities and is not yet a signatory, we would encourage you to learn more about what participation in the Sea Cargo Charter means in practice. You are also welcome to join us at our Annual Meeting in Geneva on 30 April, held immediately after the Geneva Dry event, where you can meet the leadership and representatives from our signatories.

Source: Sea Cargo Charter