Sri Lanka prohibits ship breaking (Mainly in the East Coast).

Sri Lanka prohibits ship breaking
March 20, 2009 (LBO) - Sri Lanka has ruled out ship breaking as an industry under its efforts to promote the island as a maritime hub, going against the trend in the region, according to a new national port and shipping policy.
The policy, the draft of which was released this week, cited environmental concerns and lack of tidal differences for the decision.

Previous shipping policies have mentioned ship breaking as one of the maritime sector industries that could be promoted to take advantage of the island's geographical position close to international shipping routes.

However, no ship breaking activity emerged on the island, in sharp contrast to Sri Lanka's neighbours, especially India and Bangladesh, which have become the dumping ground for that part of the world's shipping fleet that needs to be scrapped.

Ship breaking in India and Bangladesh has generated much controversy because of environmental pollution problems as well as worker safety concerns.

The ship breaking yards have become notorious for poor safety standards which regularly result in the deaths of workers or serious injury.

Shipping industry officials said workers safety was one of the concerns taken into consideration in the decision to ban ship breaking.

The new draft policy said that ship demolition work has much potential as large numbers of vessels are being sold for scrap and because developed nations are reluctant to allow ship breaking on their coasts.

Developed countries have had to face pressure from the public as well as environmental groups to discourage ship breaking, considered dirty and dangerous work.

The draft policy stressed that the Sri Lankan government will not encourage ship breaking.

"Ship breaking is known to create environmental pollution, including oil pollution," the draft policy said.

"The lack of significant tidal differences on the coasts of Sri Lanka does not facilitate ease of handling of ship breaking activities."

The policy also said the island's coast have to be protected for the development of the tourism industry.
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Worker safety and environmental hazards are genuine concerns but could be easily dealt with if there is a will. However, despite all the incentives provided from the time Lalith Athulathmudali was Minister of Shipping and Upali Wijewardne was the head of the Free Trade Zone, from 1977, Sri Lanka could not attract the shipping industry to be willing to bring that industry to the East Coast. Ranil as PM did appoint a Tamil to head the BOI (FTZ) for 2 years, during the peace process. However, no industry was brought to the region.

The Singhala attitude and civil war was the main reasons.

Shipping hardly developed in the North or East because of blatant discrimination and racist attitudes of both the UNP and SLFP. They tried to devlop a port in Oluvil converting a small fishing village to a commercial port by spending 150 million dollars in foreign aid. Finally the Tsunami destroyed most of the village and the fishing harbor. Two Muslim leaders Rauf Hakeem and Asraff were Ministers of Shipping and Ports since 1994. Now the President's brother is the Minister and they are spending millions of dollars trying to build a brand new port in Hambantota, instead of developing the existing ports like Colombo, Trincomalee and the minor ports such as Galle, KKS and Point Pedro.

It is all a case of lost opportunity, while Tamils still believe that there is plenty of opportunity for the North East ports and airports such as Jaffna, Trincomalee, (The new location for Sri Lanka's second international airport), Batticaloa and Amparai, due to it's proximity to India, and South East, saving considerable flying time and convenience to the passengers final destination or transit point.

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