Óscar Puente advocates developing a global strategy to reduce pollution from international shipping

The Minister for Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Óscar Puente, and the Secretary General of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), Arsenio Domínguez, during the meeting they held in London

Óscar Puente, the Spanish Minister for Transport and Sustainable Mobility, held a meeting in London with the Secretary General of the International Maritime Organisation (IMO), the Panamanian Arsenio Domínguez, in which he defended the need to develop a global and joint strategy to mitigate maritime transport pollution at international level and to fight against climate change.

The Transport Minister thereby conveyed to the IMO's top executive that the solution must involve joint action at global level, with all international actors aligned in its execution, since the actions implemented at regional level are proving to be insufficient and entail risks for the sector's competitiveness.

"We advocate within the International Maritime Organisation that regulation should be at global level. It makes no sense that there are areas that are regulated and others that are not, and we have given the Secretary General our full support in pursuit of agreement that will enable global progress to be made in the decarbonisation of maritime transport", said the minister after the meeting.

Óscar Puente recalled that for months, Spain and other EU countries have been petitioning both the European Commission and the IMO itself to ensure the alignment of the strategies of all the international players and that no diversion of traffic to ports with lower climatic requirements will take place, thereby protecting the competitiveness of the sector.

The minister also indicated that one of Spain's priorities is to continue working to ensure that the measures are adopted by consensus among all the delegations involved.

In this context, work has been underway since October 2024 to develop medium-term measures to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which should be approved in the coming months. These measures are aimed at gradually reducing the GHG intensity of marine fuels, and at developing pricing mechanisms for these emissions. In addition, the possible creations of an IMO GHG intensity register, and of a fund or mechanism to facilitate the implementation of these measures, are being discussed.

The meeting also discussed the study being prepared within the EU on actions to prevent illegal operations by the so-called "dark fleet" (vessels that do not transmit their locations using the automatic identification system and are therefore "obscured" from public surveillance systems), which is due to be presented in the coming months at the IMO's legal committee session.

The World Maritime Organisation is a UN agency responsible for the safety and security of international shipping and the prevention of pollution from ships.

Non official translation