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108 GREEN FREIGHTIMO TAKES FURTHER ACTION ON CLIMATE CHANGEThe Paris Agreement on Climate Change was a major achievement for the international community. When UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited IMO earlier this year, he described it, along with the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals, as a victory for the world’s people, and a triumph for multilateralism – and, while this is undoubtedly true, the real challenge now is to make it happen.Whilst the Paris Agreement makes no specific mention of shipping, IMO, as the global regulator of the shipping industry, is where the Governments of the world come together to develop the regulatory framework for international shipping.A great deal of progress has already been made. To date, IMO is the only organization to have adopted energy-efficiency measures that are legally binding across an entire global industry and apply to all countries. Mandatory energy efficiency standards for new ships, and mandatory operational measures for all ships of 400 gross tonnage and above, entered into force under an existing international convention (MARPOL Annex VI) in 2013. By 2025, all new ships will be 30 per cent more energyefficient than those built in 2014. This is more than a target, it is a legal requirement and, to date, more than 1,600 new ships have been certified as complying with the new standards.More recently, Governments at the IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee have approved mandatory requirements for ships to record and report their fuel consumption. This not only builds on the Organization’s work to date, it also sends a clear and positive signal about the Organization’s continuing commitment to climate change mitigation.The mandatory data collection system is the first in a three-step process in which analysis of the data collected would provide the basis for an objective, transparent and inclusive policy debate at IMO. This would allow a decision to be made on whether any further measures are needed to enhance energy efficiency and address greenhouse gas emissions from international shipping. If so, proposed policy options would then be considered.In simple terms, the system will require ships of 5,000 gross tonnage and above to collect consumption data for each type of fuel they use. The aggregated data will be reported to IMO by the flag State after the end of each calendar year and IMO would be required to produce an annual report to the MEPC, summarizing the data collected. Data would be anonymized so individual ship data would not be recognized.The draft mandatory data collection requirements will be put forward for formal adoption at the next MEPC session in October this year, and could enter into force as early as 2018.I welcomed the positive spirit in which IMO Member States approached the discussion during the last MEPC meeting and it was encouraging to see States which had previously found it difficult to reach a binding agreement bring the spirit of the Paris Agreement to IMO.Moving beyond the regulatory field, IMO is now KITACK LIM, SECRETARY-GENERAL, INTERNATIONAL MARITIME ORGANIZATION (IMO)