Japanese ship owners meet Bangladeshi ship breakers and recyclers

A 14-member delegation of the Japanese Shipowners' Association (JSA) met with members of the Bangladesh Ship Breakers and Recyclers Association (BSBRA) at a views exchange at Radisson Blue hotel in Chattogram on Friday night.

Keiji Tomoda, vice president of JSA, was the chief guest at the meeting while Keynote Speaker of Global Marketing Systems (GMS) Dr Anil F Sharma attended as the special guest.

NYK Line General Manager and Japanese Ship Recycling Committee Member Takuya Koizumi, Japanese Ship Recycling Committee Alternate Member Hiroki Tanaka, ClassNK Manager Takeshi Naruse, Director of MLIT Masanori Yoshida, and JSA Deputy General Manager Yamagami Hiroyuki, among others, were present at the meeting.

BSBRA President Md Abu Taher presided over the meeting addressed, among others, by BSBRA executive committee vice president and senior member Shaukat Ali Chowdhury, and BSBRA vice president-3 Zahirul Islam Rinku spoke.

On Saturday morning, the Japanese delegation visited the 'Treatment Storage and Disposal Facility (TSDF)' site and the country's first green ship yard PHP Ship Recyclers Yard at Sitakunda.

At the same time, workers from the ship breaking industry formed a human chain in front of BSBRA office in Banur Bazar area at Bhatiari demanding that the ship recycling industry be brought back to ‘orange’ category from ‘red’ category.

According to the workers, the owners are not able to start the cutting activities of several ships as the Department of Environment is not providing ‘no objection’ certificate. As a result, the workers are losing their jobs.