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How rich nations dump old cruise ships and oil tankers in developing countries
Business Insider
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3/9/2025
Gadani is the world's third biggest shipbreaking hub. But many ships come there illegally from Europe, the Middle East, and China. We went to Pakistan to figure out why international laws are being ignored.
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00:00
This is where some of the largest ships in the world come to die, the Ghadani Yard in Pakistan.
00:12
But the place is also a death trap for the hundreds of men who work to break down
00:18
these rusted giants for as little as four dollars a day.
00:22
Some of these vessels are here illegally, like the cruise ship Antares Experience,
00:34
which came from Greece. International laws ban many foreign countries from dumping their
00:41
toxic old ships on the beaches of developing countries for environmental reasons. Still,
00:47
loopholes allow these giants to come here from China, the Middle East and Europe
00:52
through indirect routes. Shipping companies deliberately lie to authorities. They do not
00:59
disclose that their true intention is to scrap these ships in the worst possible yards located
01:07
on the beaches of South Asia. Meanwhile, most workers here come from far-off villages
01:14
and have never even seen the ocean or a ship before.
01:18
So why are these vessels ending up on the shores of Pakistan?
01:23
And who is responsible for the safety of these underpaid workers
01:27
propping up a billion-dollar recycling industry?
01:30
This 85,000-ton Greek carrier supplied coal around the world. But after sailing for 21 years,
01:40
the Enterprise Majuro is falling apart. At 150 feet tall and 900 feet long, this beast
01:49
will take a fleet of 200 workers a day to clean up the wreckage.
01:54
And 900 feet long, this beast will take a fleet of 200 workers about three months to fillet for
02:01
its parts. Many of them live right on the yard, like Azam Khan, who moved here from northern Pakistan.
02:10
These huts belong to the boss of this ship lot. And the men live here rent-free as long as they
02:17
work six days a week and don't go outside past 8pm. No one here has clean running water. And they all
02:27
share a communal bathroom. And no one here has clean running water. And they all share a communal
02:39
bathroom.
02:52
Azam bandages his shoes for extra protection.
03:09
Azam's main job is to break up smaller parts once they've been separated from the rods that hold the
03:15
body of the ship.
03:17
Gadani gets mostly cargo carriers, oil tankers, and cruise liners.
03:23
Like this 1994 Carnival Fascination.
03:29
Gadani gets mostly cargo carriers, oil tankers, and cruise liners.
03:35
Like this 1994 Carnival Fascination.
03:37
Like this 1994 Carnival Fascination.
03:49
Like this 1994 Carnival Fascination.
03:51
became outdated.
03:54
The ship was sold to a Chinese cruise company,
03:56
which soon decided to sell it for scrap.
04:01
To break down vessels here,
04:03
workers use what's called the gravity method.
04:06
They mostly let the parts fall on their own.
04:14
But that's how accidents can happen,
04:16
says Mohammad Ashraf,
04:17
who has worked here for half his life.
04:21
It's dangerous.
04:23
You can die on the road, but you can't die on the ship.
04:34
Tractors drag the larger parts to shore,
04:38
where workers break them down.
04:43
Ashraf has to take apart this entire chamber.
04:52
In the water, the electric current
04:54
could kill him in an instant.
04:58
Most ships don't make it past the age of 30.
05:01
Their insides begin to rust.
05:06
Many contain poisonous chemicals like asbestos,
05:09
residual oil, and toxic paint.
05:13
And breathing the dust
05:15
can cause permanent lung damage or death.
05:18
Nearly 2,000 people have been severely injured
05:22
or killed on this beach since the late 1960s.
05:26
But that number is likely much higher.
05:30
Many workers disappear or drown under falling parts,
05:34
and their deaths often don't get tracked.
05:38
An international law enacted in 1992
05:42
technically requires countries to document
05:44
all toxic waste in the ocean.
05:48
But experts say this is often ignored.
06:19
Shipbreaking became a big business in Pakistan
06:21
in the 1980s,
06:23
after Europe began regulating ship waste pollution
06:26
on its own shores.
06:28
That's when many developed nations
06:30
started sending their vessels off to countries
06:32
with lax environmental regulations and cheap labor.
06:36
The industry grew across South Asia,
06:39
with yards expanding rapidly
06:41
in Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh.
06:48
In the late 80s and 90s,
06:50
reports of accidents, poor work conditions,
06:53
and child labor started to come out,
06:57
triggering a wave of international laws
06:59
that tried to regulate the business.
07:02
Nowadays, developed countries aren't technically allowed
07:05
to send their ships to places that don't have
07:07
the same environmental standards and labor laws.
07:11
But it happens anyway.
07:14
Like with the Antares experience,
07:16
which came from Greece illegally.
07:19
We reached out to the ship's
07:20
most recent recorded owners and operators,
07:23
but did not get a response.
07:26
But the most common paths are legal loopholes.
07:29
For example, a European shipping company
07:32
could get away with sending its vessel
07:34
for scrapping to Pakistan
07:36
if it first sends it to another country
07:38
that's allowed to export it there.
07:41
Another way to get around the law
07:43
is by registering a ship under countries
07:46
with lax regulations known as flags of convenience.
07:51
Like the Enterprise, which was owned by a Greek company,
07:54
but registered under the Marshall Islands,
07:57
a country known for its low taxes.
08:00
Reports of the ships beached in Ghani in 2023 and 2024
08:04
show that most were registered
08:06
under other flags of convenience,
08:09
like Comoros, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Panama,
08:12
but were usually owned by companies in China
08:15
the Middle East, and Greece.
08:29
44-year-old Javed Iqbal sorts the parts Ashraf Qatsa.
08:41
But like most here,
08:42
he doesn't have a license to handle the screen.
08:46
He says no one's ever asked for it.
08:57
Javed moved here 25 years ago.
09:00
He sees his wife and three children once a year
09:03
if he can afford time off.
09:16
Crane operators like Javed are among the best paid on the lot.
09:20
But many workers here usually make about $4 a day,
09:24
less than the $6 minimum wage in Pakistan,
09:27
which buys two gallons of milk there.
09:31
Despite attempts to regulate the business,
09:33
cheap labor and pollution are still a problem
09:36
in yards across South Asia.
09:39
But the Aliaga yard in Turkey says it's different,
09:42
and that it's developed a recycling infrastructure
09:45
designed to handle toxic waste.
09:47
That's partly why it's become
09:49
one of the most popular destinations for Europe's old ships.
09:53
But reports show that Aliaga is heavily polluted
09:57
with toxic substances.
09:59
Now there's a new law, the Hong Kong Convention,
10:03
which is set to take effect in June 2025.
10:06
On paper, it aims to make more parties,
10:09
from the ship's owner, to its flag state,
10:12
to the country that recycles it,
10:14
responsible for safely disposing of it.
10:17
The agreement requires every arriving ship
10:20
to have an inventory of its hazardous waste
10:23
and a clear plan for how to handle it.
10:26
Before accepting a vessel,
10:28
each yard needs to submit a recycling plan to its government
10:32
and provide proof that they can do this
10:35
without contaminating the environment
10:37
or compromising workers' safety.
10:40
India, Bangladesh and Turkey have all signed the treaty
10:44
and have begun updating their yards.
10:47
Pakistan was the last major ship-breaking country
10:51
to sign the convention,
10:52
and it's done little to modernize its practices.
10:55
Pakistan is one of the worst destinations
10:59
for end-of-life vessels.
11:01
And experts say the new law may not change much.
11:06
It was crafted by the shipping industry itself,
11:09
and it's like putting the fox in charge
11:12
of managing the chickens.
11:15
If a convention will not be enforced properly
11:18
and interpreted in a strict way,
11:21
it will simply rubber-stamp current substandard practices.
11:25
It will greenwash the whole sector.
11:28
What today is illegal and unethical
11:32
will suddenly become legal and okay.
11:37
And people who have worked here their whole lives
11:40
worry about that, too.
11:57
Azam had other family members who worked here, too.
12:02
But in 2016, an old oil tanker exploded
12:06
while it was getting broken down.
12:08
The blast claimed the lives of at least 29 men.
12:12
Azam's relatives were among them.
12:15
The explosion left another 60 people
12:17
severely burned or disabled for life.
12:22
Workers we spoke with said since the incident,
12:25
their employers have first aid and ambulances on standby.
12:30
The closest hospital is about six miles away,
12:33
but it isn't equipped to handle serious cases.
12:36
The badly injured have to travel one hour to Karachi.
12:46
We couldn't reach the manager of the lot
12:48
Azam Khan works on, but we spoke with the chairman
12:51
of the Pakistan Shipbreakers Association.
12:54
He also runs a ship lot here.
13:00
What happened was that about 20 to 21 lakh rupees
13:03
of compensation was given to the workers.
13:15
That's about $750 paid to the family of a worker
13:20
who died on the job.
13:21
But activists say that families are often not notified
13:25
since many workers don't have proof of employment.
13:28
Farooqui says that's not true.
13:52
Gadoni is divided into 132 lots.
13:56
Some are owned by private landowners
13:58
and others by the government,
14:00
which leases the lots to private companies.
14:03
But these days, many are vacant
14:05
because getting a ship to Pakistan has gotten so expensive.
14:09
For example, the folks who bought the Enterprise Majuro
14:12
from its Greek owners paid about $10 million for it.
14:17
Then they had to pay a 17% customs tax
14:20
to the Pakistani government.
14:22
And another 17% tax on all the parts of the ship
14:25
that were resellable.
14:27
There's also a 1% regional tax in Gadoni.
14:31
All this adds up to roughly $13.5 million.
14:36
It's unclear if lot owners actually pay all the taxes.
14:40
Many have been accused of exploiting government connections
14:43
to skirt regulations.
14:45
But shipyard owners say getting these vessels here
14:48
ultimately helps the workers too.
14:53
Once a ship is broken apart,
14:55
workers salvage everything from desks and cabinets,
14:59
which can be resold as wood scraps,
15:01
down to the screws and cables
15:03
that once held all the ship's parts together.
15:22
In fact, up to 95% of a ship's remains can return a profit.
15:28
A ship's steel hull is among the most prized of its parts.
15:32
The manager of this ship lot can resell it to metal mills
15:36
for millions of dollars.
15:41
The Gadoni shipyard salvages
15:43
about 1.5 million tons of steel a year.
15:46
And it's not just the steel.
15:48
The shipyard salvages about 1.5 million tons of steel a year,
15:53
accounting for 20% of all the steel Pakistan uses.
15:58
It takes about 400 trucks
16:00
to move just one ship's remains to their next destination.
16:05
This truck is off to a factory in Lahore.
16:18
Then, they sort the scrap into piles,
16:21
depending on the shape and type of metal.
16:27
Workers cut the ship walls into rectangles
16:29
to fit this slicing machine.
16:49
This crew got here at 4.30 a.m.,
16:52
and they won't finish until 8 p.m.
16:57
16-hour shifts are standard here.
17:04
These links were once part of a chain used to anchor a ship.
17:10
Workers have to heat this to over 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit
17:15
Workers have to heat this to over 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit
17:19
to make the links easier to reshape.
17:22
That process emits toxic vapors,
17:25
which could permanently scar a worker's lungs.
17:39
At this factory, they usually repurpose
17:42
about 10 to 15 tons of scrap a day,
17:46
which helps reduce the nation's demand for mining new steel.
17:53
Most of the repurposed metal ends up at construction sites
17:56
across Pakistan, where it's used to build bridges,
17:59
roads, and buildings.
18:04
Every year, about 1,000 ships need to find
18:07
their final resting place,
18:09
where they'll get scrapped and recycled.
18:12
Azam isn't sure how many more he'll break down
18:15
within his lifetime.
18:17
But he says he knows that one day,
18:20
this beach will become his graveyard, too.
18:42
If you spend the rest of your life here,
18:45
you'll regret it for sure.
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