ECSA, together with the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA Europe), the European Dredging Association (EuDA) and Interferry sent a joint letter to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, requesting that all public consultations and impact assessments be put on hold, due to COVID-19.
The request highlighted that since impact assessments are usually based on data from the previous year, the landscape in Europe from a financial, business, social and employment point of view will severely change in the coming months, when the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic becomes more clearly visible.
To this effect, the four maritime sectoral partners call for the freezing of the public consultations and impact assessments for at least six months, so that the resumption of those procedures would coincide with the planned resumption of activities in the European Parliament in September.
The four organisations also reiterated their support for the European Commission’s Climate ambitions, while called for the EU to be a united, pro-active and positive voice at the IMO.
In view of the current suspension of all IMO meetings, the shipping industry also asks the European Commission and the other European institutions to push back all related time schedule pre-dating COVID-19 in order to align it with the IMO schedule.
ECSA added that this unprecedented crisis requires unprecedented reactions. For Europe to ensure the survival of its strategically important maritime industry, more concerted and targeted actions will be necessary. For this reason, it calls on all the European institutions to adopt a targeted rescue and recovery plan for the maritime sector.
The lack of direct input from shipowners to their national shipowners associations negatively affects the ability of the European Commission’s departments to accurately assess the impact of the proposed legislative options through Impact Assessment processes which are due in the near future
wrote the four associations in the letter.
