Ballast Water News Issue 16: January - March 2004

After fourteen years of complex and sometimes sensitive negotiations, IMO member States adopted the International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships’ Ballast Water and Sediments on 13 February this year. Considering the enormous scientific and technological challenges, and the highly complex and multi-disciplinary nature of the problem; encompassing biology, chemistry, engineering, law, economics and ecology, not to mention ship design, construction and operation, achieving consensus on the Convention must be seen as a major achievement.