ILO and BIMCO Launch Bangladesh Ship Recycling Injury Pilot
The International Labour Organization and BIMCO, the world's largest international shipping association, have launched a joint pilot programme targeting workplace injury reduction at ship recycling yards in Chittagong, Bangladesh. The two-year initiative will implement safety management system improvements, worker training programmes, and injury reporting standardisation at five participating yards. The pilot represents the first direct collaboration between the ILO and a major shipping industry body on ship recycling worker safety in Bangladesh.
Why Is This Pilot Necessary?
Bangladesh is the world's second-largest ship recycling nation by tonnage, behind India, processing approximately 200 to 250 vessels annually at the beaching yards clustered along the coast near Chittagong. The industry employs an estimated 30,000 to 50,000 workers directly, with significantly more in supporting roles. It is a major source of steel for Bangladesh's construction sector and a significant employer in one of the country's poorest regions.
However, working conditions at Bangladeshi ship recycling yards have been subject to sustained international criticism. The NGO Shipbreaking Platform documented 21 worker fatalities and over 30 serious injuries at Bangladeshi yards in 2025 alone. Common hazards include falls from height, exposure to asbestos and other hazardous materials, fire and explosion risks during hot cutting operations, and crushing injuries from uncontrolled structural collapses.
Bangladesh has not ratified the Hong Kong International Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships, which entered into force in June 2025. While the government has implemented national ship recycling regulations, enforcement capacity and compliance levels vary significantly across the approximately 130 active yards.
What Does the Pilot Programme Include?
The ILO-BIMCO pilot focuses on five yards that have volunteered to participate and that meet baseline criteria for infrastructure and management capability. The programme includes four main components.
Safety management system implementation. Participating yards will adopt structured safety management systems modelled on ILO guidelines for occupational safety in shipbreaking, covering hazard identification, risk assessment, permit-to-work procedures, and emergency response planning.
Worker training. The pilot will deliver competency-based training to approximately 2,000 workers across the five yards, covering safe hot work procedures, working at height, hazardous material handling, personal protective equipment use, and first aid. Training will be delivered in Bengali using materials developed specifically for the literacy and language context of the Chittagong workforce.
Injury reporting standardisation. One of the fundamental challenges in assessing ship recycling safety is the inconsistency and underreporting of workplace injuries. The pilot will implement a standardised injury reporting system using the ILO's classification framework, enabling meaningful comparison across yards and over time.
Equipment and infrastructure upgrades. BIMCO has secured funding from member shipping companies to provide safety equipment including fall arrest systems, gas detection instruments, fire suppression equipment, and personal protective equipment for workers at participating yards.
How Does the Shipping Industry Connect to Recycling Safety?
Shipowners who sell vessels for recycling bear a chain of responsibility that extends, under various regulatory frameworks, to the conditions under which those vessels are dismantled. The EU Ship Recycling Regulation requires EU-flagged vessels to be recycled at approved facilities on the European List, which currently excludes all Bangladeshi yards. However, vessels flagged to non-EU registries — which account for the vast majority of ships recycled in Bangladesh — are not subject to this requirement.
BIMCO's participation in the pilot signals the mainstream shipping industry's recognition that voluntary engagement with recycling yard safety is both an ethical obligation and a reputational necessity. Several major shipowners and managers, including members of the Ship Recycling Transparency Initiative, have adopted internal policies requiring recycling at yards that meet specified safety and environmental standards.
What Would Success Look Like?
The pilot's primary metric is a measurable reduction in lost-time injury rates at participating yards over the two-year programme period. Secondary metrics include the number of workers trained, the adoption rate of safety management procedures, and the accuracy and completeness of injury reporting data.
If successful, the pilot framework could be scaled to additional yards in Bangladesh and potentially adapted for India's Alang recycling complex and Pakistan's Gadani yards.
Conclusion
The ILO-BIMCO Bangladesh ship recycling pilot is a targeted intervention in an industry where the human cost of inadequate safety standards is measured in lives. The programme's emphasis on practical training, standardised reporting, and equipment provision addresses the most actionable drivers of workplace injuries. For the shipping industry, the pilot represents a step toward closing the gap between the standards applied to vessel operations at sea and the conditions under which those vessels end their service lives.