ECSA Urges European Parliament to Approve Two Indian Recycling Yards

The European Community Shipowners' Associations (ECSA) asked Members of the European Parliament to reject a motion for a resolution objecting to the European Commission's proposal to include two Indian shipyards on the European List of Ship Recycling Facilities. The vote is scheduled for November 4 in the European Parliament's Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety.

The two shipyards in question, YSI Recycling Services LLP (also referred to as YSI Recyclers) and Shree Ram Vessel Scrap Pvt. Ltd., are located in the Alang-Sosiya ship-breaking hub, in the Indian state of Gujarat. The European Commission had proposed their inclusion in July 2026, following an extensive inspection period that confirmed both facilities comply with the requirements of the EU Ship Recycling Regulation (EU SRR). The initiative was backed in September by a joint statement from the global shipping industry and by an open letter to EU ministers calling for the adoption of the updated list.

Sotiris Raptis, ECSA's Secretary General, noted that the inclusion of the two Indian shipyards on the European list represents an expected and welcome step, rewarding the investments made to meet EU standards, and warned that objecting to the inclusion of facilities that comply with the EU's stringent environmental and safety standards would undermine the credibility of the EU's own legislation.

ECSA argues that recognizing shipyards outside the bloc is necessary given the current state of the sector. According to BIMCO data cited by the sources, around 16,000 vessels, equivalent to roughly 700 million deadweight tonnes, will need to be recycled over the next decade, a figure more than double the number of vessels and nearly triple the tonnage recycled over the past ten years. European facilities, concentrated on local markets and the scrapping of small offshore platforms, lack the space, labor and equipment needed to process large oceangoing vessels, and the only alternative within the EU is a small number of approved shipyards in Turkey, which also lack sufficient capacity.

Numerous recycling facilities in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, known in industry parlance as the Indian Subcontinent, have already been approved under the International Maritime Organization's Hong Kong Convention, but had not yet been recognized under the EU Ship Recycling Regulation. Added to this is the United Nations' Basel Convention, which prohibits the transboundary movement of hazardous waste from OECD and EU countries to developing nations, a category that includes India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, requiring shipowners to follow complex ownership-transfer procedures in order to sell their vessels to shipyards in the region.