MARITIME Industry Australia Ltd has offered its support for calls for IMO member states to reach consensus on a practical path for the global shipping industry to meet the ambitions set out in the 2023 IMO Strategy on Reduction of GHG Emissions from Ships.
A consortium that claims to represent half of the world’s shipping tonnage is calling on the IMO to consider alternatives to the Net Zero Framework (NZF) and to seek genuine consensus on a way forward, ahead of the Marine Environment Protection Committee’s MEPC 84 meeting in London next week.
The coalition includes the world's three largest open ship registries, the Liberian Registry, the Panama Maritime Authority, and the Marshall Islands Registry, as well as two of the world's leading classification societies, major national and regional shipowner associations across Europe, Asia, and the Americas, and prominent shipping companies operating across all major vessel segments.
MIAL chief executive Angela Gillham noted that a “…global industry needs consistent global regulation to avoid uncertainty for business investment, and the potential for overlapping regional decarbonisation schemes to impose multiple penalties for the same emissions”.
“The shipping industry needs regulatory certainty more than ever given current geopolitical unrest, and it is vitally important that IMO member states consider all proposals that provide a way forward,” she told DCN.
“Good faith negotiation between member states and the continued application of accepted IMO procedural processes, will go a long way to ensuring that any adopted proposal provides industry the certainty it needs, that is: solution neutral, recognising the need for incentives, addressing concerns about the availability and cost of alternative fuels, and supportive of technology development.”
In an open letter the consortium re-capped that the extraordinary session of the MEPC ES.2 in October 2025 concluded without the adoption of the Net-Zero Framework, an outcome that underscored the depth of the divisions that remain among IMO Member States.
“Since that session, the coalition notes that concerns regarding the NZF's practical implementation have grown, and support for the framework in its current form has continued to erode," it stated.
“The signatories reaffirm their conviction that the IMO is, and must remain, the essential global regulator for international shipping. Only the IMO has the mandate, the legitimacy, and the reach to deliver the level playing field that shipowners, fuel producers, and investors need to commit the trillions of dollars required to decarbonize the global fleet.
“Regulatory uncertainty is not a neutral condition; it delays progress, inflates costs, and ultimately slows the very transition the world needs. The window for action is now. The coalition stands ready to support Member States in finding that path forward.”