BIMCO and Ocean Bottle partner to eliminate single-use plastic bottles on board ships

        Recently, BIMCO announced a partnership with Ocean Bottle, a European thermos company, to support its campaign to remove single-use plastic bottles from ships. BIMCO believes that if many people take a small step in the right direction, it will be a big step towards solving the plastic crisis.

        On board, even if plastics are sorted, managed and discharged to shore in an appropriate manner, poor waste management on land means that these plastics can still return to the ocean. Therefore, BIMCO added that removing unnecessary plastics from ships is the best option. "Unnecessary" refers to plastics that will be simply used once and then thrown away. Up to 1.75 billion plastic bottles are used on ships every year, so just this small action will have a very large impact on the marine environment. Reusable bottles should be used on board, and single-use plastic bottles should be switched to sustainable alternatives such as onboard water dispensers or larger dispensers.

        BIMCO estimates that the system cost of this action on board is a quarter of providing water in single-use plastic bottles, and that it pays for itself in just one year. Switching gear reduces CO2 emissions - evidence suggests that each ship could save around 2,355 kg of emissions per year. While there are many reusable bottles available on the market, with different bottles suitable for different vessels, BIMCO has partnered with Ocean Bottle to support the campaign and provide a product that can help spread the message. Ocean Bottle collects 11.4 kg of marine plastic from the world's most polluted waterways, which is more than 1,000 single-use plastic bottles. The plastic is collected by locals from the most affected coastal communities in the Philippines, Brazil, Egypt, Ghana, India and Indonesia, who then exchange the plastic for money or receive digital credit for school fees, tech products, healthcare and microfinance.

        This infrastructure was made possible with the help of partners PlasticBank, PlasticsforChange and rePurpose, who set up the collection sites and secured transactions with collectors through traceability technology. Ocean Bottle’s initiative means that everyone can recycle single-use plastics every day. BIMCO will promote this practice among key stakeholders in the coming months.