Cost of IMO 2020 Still a Major Unknown: Survey

by Ship & Bunker News Team
Wednesday October 3, 2018

A new survey by Drewry has painted a bleak picture of the industry's understanding of what the cost of compliance will be for the upcoming IMO 2020 rule.

Of the respondents, 75% of global shippers/Beneficial Cargo Owners (BCOs) said they had yet to receive information from their providers on how the cost will be met.

For the carriers that do have a cost revery plan, more than half of all respondents (56%) said they did not consider it to be either fair or transparent.

The concerns echo comments made last month by the Global Shippers Forum (GSF), who hit out at Maersk over its IMO 2020 bunker surcharge plans.

But given the widespread media attention given to the new 0.50% sulfur cap, perhaps the most startling finding of the survey is that a third of respondents said they had poor or very poor awareness and understanding of the new regulation.

"The IMO low-sulphur rule change represents a very significant, industry-wide, change event which will likely have far reaching effects on the global shipping industry for many years to come", said Philip Damas, Head of Drewry Supply Chain Advisors.

"Given the scale of the extra costs triggered by the new regulation and the carriers' expectations that their pricing and fuel charge mechanism with customers must be restructured, there is a need for carriers to address the transparency concerns expressed by their customers."

Ship & Bunker News Team
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