Optimizing waste management for green shipping: industry commitment through participatory processes in Cyprus

Fourteen gaps and needs for the Cypriot shipping industry were identified and ranked by the stakeholders during the 2021–2022 workshop, and three solutions were identified and ranked for each of the five top-ranking needs (Table 1). There were two gaps/needs that concerned port reception facilities. The most important need (gap/need #1) concerned better infrastructure and services at port reception facilities. This is a particularly contentious point that was discussed at length during the workshop. According to ship owners and managers, waste onboard is separated and stored according to MARPOL, however, when ships reach port, the waste is collected all together in large skips. The Cyprus Port Authority (CPA) maintains that vessel crew fail to properly sort their waste, resulting in mixed or contaminated waste that cannot be accepted by waste collection companies. As a result, the CPA obtained a waste handling license from the Cypriot Department of Environment, which allows it to collect all the ship waste in a skip and then properly sort it into the various categories. The shipping industry noted that there is no accountability or responsibility when it comes to waste management and delivery (gap/need #4), mainly stemming from a lack of proper monitoring. For example, it was noted that there is no record of the weights of different wastes that are collected from ships at Cypriot ports, therefore there is no detailed baseline upon which to compare the results of waste minimization efforts. There are also no fines for those who do not comply with the proper waste separation requirement. The issue of insufficient controls and repercussions for non-compliant vessels has been identified in other work in the Mediterranean (Kyramargiou and Vardopoulos 2019). As potential solutions to address these issues, stakeholders suggested that there must be better separation of waste at port reception facilities, proper implementation of legislation that allows for controls and checks on vessels, greater monitoring in terms of weights collected, and increased accountability through the imposition of fines for those who fail to comply with mandatory waste segregation requirements.

Additionally, the stakeholders proposed that means to incentivize waste minimization should be implemented. Currently, the CPA implements an indirect fee system, whereby various categories of vessels pay a fixed waste handling fee regardless of whether they have any waste to deliver or not. The industry stakeholders suggested that this should be complemented by a Pay As You Throw scheme to incentivize vessels to reduce their waste. Towards this goal, it was also suggested that a Deposit Refund System can be implemented on board vessels to incentivize individual crew members (for commercial vessels) and passengers (for cruise vessels) to separately collect waste with greater recycling value.

Working on the further development of an environmental culture within the shipping industry, and sustainability education and capacity-building for key management personnel and crew members, was identified as the second most important need for the Cypriot shipping industry. This concerned specifically educating about the potential impacts of the industry’s improper waste management on the marine and coastal environment, but also building capacity on best practices that could be implemented across the supply chain to reduce resource consumption and thus minimize waste production. The first means through which this could be achieved was through the provision of incentives for participation at trainings, and for monetary/contractual incentives through, for example, supply chain management. However, stakeholders also noted that until there is a noticeable and adequate culture shift within the industry, more controls could be implemented, and fines could be issued to polluters. Importantly, industry stakeholders stated that there are two misconceptions in the public domain regarding the shipping industry. The first is that the industry is a main culprit of marine litter pollution. The second is more of a lack of awareness rather than a misconception and concerns the fact that most Cypriots, particularly youth, are unaware of the size and importance of shipping to the island’s economy and of potential career opportunities within the industry. Therefore, they suggested that greater effort should be placed on the implementation of awareness-raising campaigns and knowledge transfer activities targeting the public and other key target audiences such as for example youth.

Ranking third in the list was the need for more technological solutions and alternative materials that will help the industry minimize its waste. To do so, best practices that work elsewhere should be examined, assessed, adapted and transferred to the Cypriot shipping industry. Recognizing that this might not be sufficient, solution-oriented research and development should be implemented to address any specificities of the Cypriot industry and Cypriot facilities in terms of scale, insularity and so on. It was also noted that it is important to ensure that incentives are in place for companies to adopt emerging innovative technologies.

The stakeholders recognized that greater synergies are required between land and sea operations at Cypriot ports, but also between countries, as shipping is a global industry (gap/need #5). This could be implemented through simple means where there is a cohesive way to separate waste streams on vessels and at shore, for example through a colour coding system.

Synergies should also be explored between ship owners/managers, suppliers and crew educators as this will allow a common understanding of how products are purchased and how waste is handled. Finally, the stakeholders suggested that synergies should be formalized as much as possible to allow effective and constant coordination between those involved.

Using the outputs from the first DeCyDe-4-Shipping decision making workshop, the authors developed the 2021–2022 Action Plan (Additional file 1: Table S1) to optimize waste management. The developed Action Plan includes actions split across four Pillars:

These four Pillars arose from the grouping of the practices and actions that were discussed at the workshop into wider categories. For each of the actions in the Action Plan there is a recommended implementation schedule identifying short-term (completed within 1 year), medium-term (completed between 1 and 3 years), or long-term (completed between 3 and 5 years) actions.

The monitoring of the 2021–2022 Action Plan implementation was done across the four Pillars of the 2021–2022 Action Plan. The process is collective, the stakeholders themselves identify, record, report the practices they implement, either by sending them before the workshop to the facilitators or presenting them during the workshop. Thirty-five practices implemented by the Cypriot shipping industry to minimise waste production and optimise waste management were recorded (Table 2). Some of these practices are implemented in Cyprus whereas others, reported mainly by shipping management companies and logistics/supply provision companies, concern practices that are implemented on-board or at ports of call, and are thus more international in nature. The wide geographic coverage of the practices demonstrates the positive impact that waste management minimization and optimization practices implemented by the Cypriot shipping industry can have globally.

Five of the eight practices recorded under Pillar A are implemented in Cyprus. They are implemented either by the Cyprus Port Authority or by privately operated port terminals and concern mainly the identification of licensed waste handlers that can collect the waste delivered from vessels and the provision of a greater number of equipment, mainly skips and compactors, to be able to accommodate the collection of the delivered waste. The relevant legislative framework on the operation of ports includes an article that allows the Cyprus Port Authority to impose reduced fees to vessels that call at Cypriot ports if they can prove that they have implemented practices for the reduction of their waste. This was recorded as an implemented industry action. However, as it emerged from the discussion among stakeholders, neither the law nor the CPA specify what type of proof would be acceptable, resulting in uncertainty among vessels, which in turn leads to the non-application of this particular article. The practices under Pillar A which are implemented abroad concern bilateral agreements of ship management or supply provision companies with specific ports or waste handlers to ensure that waste is separately collected and recycled, even at ports of call where such practices are not implemented as a standard.

The smallest number of practices was recorded under Pillar B on policy implementation and enforcement, where five practices implemented in Cyprus were recorded. Three of these practices concern improved monitoring of what is delivered at ports, one of which is implemented by a privately operated port terminal and the other two by consulting firms that support the shipping industry to improve its monitoring and reporting as part of their wider sustainability practices. Interestingly, no practices were recorded under action B2 “Impose fines to polluters”. This could link back to the issue of lack of monitoring and enforcement of the legislation that was identified by the stakeholders during the first workshop, suggesting that this problem persists. The last two recorded practices under action B3 “Formalize synergies” concern work done by a consulting firm with the International Maritime Purchasing Association to develop the International Maritime Procurement Sustainability Standard, and the implementation of the annual stakeholder workshops that are presented herein. Interestingly, both of these were initiated by the private sector, albeit the workshops are supported by the Shipping Deputy Ministry of Cyprus, a public authority.

No practices were recorded for action C1 “Identify the main technological research and development needs”. This is not surprising considering that there is no initiative to record the technological needs of the industry, nor are there industry-specific calls from the Shipping Deputy Ministry or the Research and Innovation Foundation, the public research funding institution in Cyprus. One supply provision company stated that they provide public exposure for any of their clients that use innovative technologies to minimise their resource consumption as an incentive for others to do so (action C2) whereas a ship management company mentioned that they fund a local NGO to implement research work on microplastics as part of their corporate social responsibility activities (action C3). Four practices were recorded under action C4 “Waste minimisation practices”, all of them implemented in Cyprus, or on Cypriot vessels, concerning the provision of reverse osmosis systems to minimise single use plastic bottles, taking steps to minimise all single use plastics, and collaborating with manufacturers to reduce the packaging of their delivered goods. This last practice was reported by a privately operated port terminal, and specifically concerns the packaging of safety boots that they purchase in bulk for their staff. The port terminal asked their supplier to deliver the safety boots without their cardboard packaging to minimise resources and prevent waste production. The supplier, based in Europe, charged them an extra fee for this service. This example demonstrates how a wider shift in mindsets and business models is required across the supply chain, as currently those thinking “outside the box” are asked to pay the price for it.

The greatest number of practices was recorded under Pillar D “Environmental Behaviour and Awareness Raising”. Five practices aiming to raise awareness for the public were recorded, implemented by the Shipping Deputy Ministry of Cyprus, the Cyprus Shipping Chamber, NGOs and private consulting firms working with the shipping industry. Eight practices were recorded under action D2 “Education for crew and decision-makers” and include training and awareness raising activities for crew and at-shore personnel, and for the public. The last practice in Pillar D regards the Cyprus Maritime Awards that are implemented by the Shipping Deputy Ministry of Cyprus as a means of awarding pro-environmental behaviour within the shipping industry.

The recording of already implemented practices provided the background against which the shipping industry could set its annual Action Plan for 2022–2023 (Table 3). Three priority actions were defined for creating fit-for-purpose port reception facilities (Pillar A). While the Cyprus Port Authority and privately managed port terminals already have lists of waste management companies that are licensed to collect and transport waste that comes to Cypriot ports, the industry believes that it is important to review this list and add stricter criteria leading to the selection of contractors that are able to utilize the waste that they collect in accordance with the principles of the circular economy. Developing the necessary infrastructure that will allow waste to be properly segregated and thus valorised was identified as a subsequent priority action (A2). To facilitate and incentivise waste minimization among vessels, the stakeholders considered that it is a matter of priority for the CPA to issue guidelines clarifying the documentation that vessels need to procure to benefit from the reduced fees provision of the law governing the operation of port authorities.

Other actions that would incentivize and support the waste minimization efforts of the Cypriot shipping industry were also decided. Specifically, in Pillar B, stakeholders prioritized the improvement in the monitoring of waste that vessels delivered so that information on the amounts per category of waste is available, thus setting a benchmark across which to base the monitoring of the success of waste minimization efforts. In Pillar C, stakeholders stated that incentives for the adoption of innovative technologies that can lead to waste minimization should be provided (Action C2), whereas from an institutional point of view stakeholders noted that the Shipping Deputy Ministry can include an award for waste minimisation in its annual Cyprus Maritime Awards (action D3).

To address the need for identifying and testing new innovative technologies that would support the industry in its waste minimization efforts, the stakeholders prioritized the provision of opportunities for the financing of R&D activities and pilot applications through several funding mechanisms, including the Research and Innovation Foundation of Cyprus, the Ministry of Finance of Cyprus, and the European Structural Funds. Resilience and Recovery Funds could also be used towards this direction as the research would support the transition to a green and circular economy. The concept of the circular economy (CE) and how it relates to the shipping industry was discussed at length during the workshop, as the industry recorded a self-perceived gap on this topic. Indeed, there is a scarcity of research work on applying the CE model in the shipping industry. This is because the CE is a place-based model in most cases, delimited and limited by the capacities and resources of the business ecosystem it is being developed in. Research work, for example, refers to circular ports or circular city-ports (de Langen, et al. 2020; Mańkowska et al. 2020; Roberts et al. 2021). Similarly, in this workshop, the port was considered the central point around which the CE system would be developed. This is not to say that port authorities were considered solely responsible for establishing a CE ecosystem. Stakeholder collaboration is very important, as industrial symbiosis needs to be developed both within the port and between the port and the surrounding territory for a truly circular model to be established (Girard 2013).

For the purposes of this work, the circular economy was thought of within the boundaries of the definition used by the European Commission, i.e. a “system which maintains the value of products, materials and resources in the economy for as long as possible, and minimises the generation of waste. This means a system where products are reused, repaired, remanufactured or recycled.” (EUR-Lex 2023). This was a fitting definition for a workshop focusing on waste minimization and the optimization in the management of a variety of solid wastes produced and arriving at ports.

It was evident to the stakeholders that significant work must be implemented to transform Cypriot ports into circular ports, and while this is not something that can be achieved in a year, the stakeholders maintained that this should remain a part of the Action Plan as steps must begin to be taken in this direction. One of the first steps is including the circular economy and how it relates to shipping and how the supply chain can be managed to incorporate circularity principles, as training topics for crew and shipping industry decision-makers since these concepts are not particularly clear.

The practices included in the 2022–2023 Action Plan were grouped into four Pillars. Information in literature regarding waste minimization and waste management optimization in the shipping industry is particularly scarce, and it was not possible to identify similar Action Plans with which to compare the one developed in this work. Notably, however, Pillars B, C and D of the developed Action Plan reflect what Brynolf et al. (2016) have called the “three pillars for a greener maritime industry”, being technological advancement, regulations and increasing awareness.