Principles overview

Aligning chartering activities of charterers and shipowners with society’s goals

The Sea Cargo Charter is a framework for assessing and disclosing the climate alignment of ship chartering activities. The Sea Cargo Charter creates a common global baseline that is consistent with and supportive of society’s goals to better enable charterers and shipowners to align their chartering activities with responsible environmental behaviour to promote international shipping’s decarbonisation.

The Sea Cargo Charter is supported by a robust and industry-appropriate climate alignment assessment methodology and carefully considered accountability and enforcement requirements that support practical and robust data collection and analysis practices. The Sea Cargo Charter also establishes transparency requirements for signatories. Thus, assessment of climate alignment, accountability, enforcement and transparency make up the four principles at the core of the Sea Cargo Charter

Principle 1: Assessment of climate alignment

This principle provides step-by-step guidance for measuring the climate alignment of signatories’ activities with the agreed climate target. It establishes a common methodology for calculating the emissions intensity and total GHG emissions, and thus also provides the input needed to track the decarbonisation trajectories used to assess signatories’ alignment.

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Principle 2: Accountability

To ensure that information provided under the principles is practical, unbiased, and accurate, it is crucial that signatories only use reliable data types, sources, and service providers.

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Principle 3: Enforcement

This principle provides the mechanism for meeting the requirement of the Sea Cargo Charter. It also includes a recommended charter party clause, the Sea Cargo Charter Clause, to ensure data collection. While the wording of the Sea Cargo Charter Clause is strongly recommended, it is not compulsory for signatories.

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Principle 4: Transparency

The intent of the transparency principle is to ensure both the awareness of the Sea Cargo Charter and that accurate information can be published by the Secretariat in a timely manner. Furthermore, transparency is key in driving behavioural change.