Implementation of IMO Legal Instruments: International Technical and Financial Cooperation - Prevention of Pollution of the Marine Environment from Vessels - page 131

7.4 Major Challenges in Implementation

The above discussion depicts a bleak picture of non-compliance with international
marine environmental conventions in developing countries. Developing countries
are handicapped in a vicious circle of a lack of political will, and technical and
financial inability. The major bottlenecks of implementation of international marine
environmental conventions in developing countries can be summarised as
follows. 40

7.4.1 Implementation of IMO Conventions in Domestic

Legal System

One of the main challenges for developing countries is the implementation of IMO
conventions in their domestic legal frameworks. Many States consider it contrary to
their sovereignty to apply an intentional convention directly in the domestic sphere.
Most countries need enabling legislation to give effect to the IMO conventions in
the domestic arena. IMO conventions are highly technical, and some developing
countries lack the legal expertise to properly draft enabling domestic legalisation to
give effect to these conventions. However, a lack of legal expertise may not be a
hurdle for all developing countries because many developing countries

lawyers
have been trained by the IMO. The main problem is the non-utilisation of these
experts by their respective governments.

'

7.4.2 Lack of Political Will

There is a widespread lack of political will in developing countries concerning the
state of the marine environment and the socio-economic impact of marine environ-
mental pollution. While some developing countries

recent achievements in eco-
nomic development are remarkable, their environmental initiative is rather mixed.
Often these nations respond to the global environmental protection movement with
several reservations, implied or expressed. This is reflective of the fact that the

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40

These bottlenecks have been identified from author ' s experience of working as an environmen-
tal lawyer in different jurisdictions as well as from the following papers on developing countries:
Beckman R., Ratification and Effective Implementation of IMO Conventions in the East Asian
Seas Region, paper presented at the East Asian Seas Congress, Haikou City, Hainan Province, PR
China, 12-16 December 2006; Alam Z, IMO Conventions and their Implementation, paper
presented at the East Asian Seas Congress, Haikou City, Hainan Province, PR China, 12-
16 December 2006; and APCEL (1996) Proceeding of the IMO/APCEL/MPA Workshop on the
Ratification and Implementation of MARPOL73/78 in the East Asian Seas: 30 October-
1 November 1996, Singapore. APCEL, Singapore.