Shipping line won’t carry plastic waste

Global ocean shipping line CMA CGM Group has announced that it will no longer carry plastic waste.

During the One Ocean Summit organized by Emmanuel Macron, president of France, Rodolphe Saadé, chairman and CEO of the CMA CGM Group, announced that after May 2022 the shipping line would no longer be transporting any plastic waste aboard its ships.

The CMA CGM Group serves more than 420 ports around the world on five continents. Using a fleet of 545 vessels, in 2020 the Group transported nearly 21 million TEU (twenty-foot equivalent units) containers.

Committed to the energy transition in shipping, and a pioneer in the use of alternative fuels, the CMA CGM Group has set a target of carbon neutrality by 2050. An approach involving ongoing improvement which brings concrete results, with a decrease of 4% in the total CO₂ emissions of the Group in 2020.

Conserving biodiversity

Every year, around 10 million tons of plastic waste end up in the sea. Unless action is taken, that figure is set to triple over the next 20 years to reach 29 million tons per year, which will cause irreversible damage to marine ecosystems, fauna and flora.

The causes of this pollution include open-air storage and the absence of processing infrastructure for plastic waste that does not actively get recycled or reused.

Zero plastic waste to be transported

With the decision that it will no longer transport plastic waste on board its ships, CMA CGM will prevent this type of waste from being exported to destinations where sorting, recycling or recovery cannot be assured.

The Group has thus decided to take practical steps where it has the operational capability to do so, heeding the urgent calls made by certain NGOs.

With this decision, the CMA CGM Group is stepping up its efforts to make conserving biodiversity one of the priorities of its CSR policy and to develop trade that is more responsible and fair for everyone and for the planet.