IMO has another big move!

According to reports, a groundbreaking global industry alliance, the Marine Biosafety Alliance (GIA), has officially launched to address the two most pressing environmental issues of our time—species invasion and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

The Marine Biosafety Alliance was formally established at an online meeting on June 8. Founding industry members CleanSubSea, ECOsubsea, HullWiper, Sonihull and representatives of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) attended the meeting . It is expected that more companies will join the alliance later.

IMO Secretary-General Lin Jize said that the new alliance brings together all maritime industries for the first time to find solutions for two of today’s key environmental issues-protecting marine biodiversity and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Lin Jize said: "With this new initiative, leading companies from different industries will work together to meet common challenges and move towards a more sustainable use of marine resources."

It is understood that GIA will accelerate the development of solutions to improve the management of marine biofouling, that is, aquatic organisms accumulate on the hull or underwater structures, such as platforms and aquaculture facilities.

Biofouling may cause potentially invasive species to enter a new environment, where local species may be threatened, and it may cause irreversible damage to biodiversity. It also has a major impact on many economic sectors such as fisheries, aquaculture and marine energy. Once invasive species survive in a new ecosystem, it is extremely difficult to eradicate them.

The new alliance also brings together private companies from various industries affected by biological pollution, including shipping, aquaculture, offshore oil and gas, and marine renewable energy. These maritime leaders will collaborate with the GloFouling Partnerships project jointly initiated by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), UNDP and IMO. The GloFouling Partnerships project is led by United Nations entities and aims to protect marine biodiversity by solving the problems of organisms that may accumulate on the hull and other marine structures.

The main objectives of GIA are to use human, technical and financial resources to promote industry investment in policy development and to actively promote the reform process, as well as to develop and disseminate technical solutions to improve biofouling management.

In addition, GIA's work will help to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Biofouling increases the resistance of ships, forcing ships to burn more fuel to maintain speed. The new alliance is expected to promote solutions to improve the hydrodynamic performance of ships, thereby helping to significantly reduce the carbon footprint of the shipping industry.

Andrew Hudson, head of the UNDP Water and Ocean Governance Project, pointed out: "The new alliance can help us eliminate key barriers, whether it is information barriers or technical barriers, to guide the maritime industry to achieve sustainable development goals and reduce shipping greenhouse gas emissions. contribution."

Jose Matheickal, head of the IMO partnership and project department, said: "This alliance is related to the collective pioneering efforts of all maritime industries in combating invasive species and is also bringing creativity and innovation to the development of technical solutions. At the same time, in the current The establishment of such an alliance between the four founding members has laid the foundation for a potentially huge global partnership among the players in the shipping industry."