James Herbert, secretary-general of the International Salvage Union, writes for Splash today, emphasising the importance of the Lloyd’s Open Form. It is almost impossible to see a piece of corporate writing relating to any industry today without a reference to ESG. Indeed it is now such a commonplace that it no longer needs spelling out in parenthesis. And of course shipping is no different. It is such a broad concept covering a huge range of activities, metrics, measures and policies. In shipping over past years carbon reduction and future fuels have tended to dominate the debate. It means that the threat from marine casualty and the possibility of adverse environmental impact has, perhaps, become a secondary concern. But even though shipping has become safer and the number of incidents has reduced, owners, managers and insurers must not lose sight of the importance of being prepared for dealing with emergencies and being able to demonstrate as part of their ESG credentials they are prepared and take this aspect of their operations very seriously. And when it comes to responding to marine casualty and preventing an incident from turning into a disaster in many cases the only agency available to respond are the professional, commercial marine salvage companies. These are the 50 members of the International Salvage Union – the global association that represents their interests. We know that our key stakeholders – shipowners, property and liability insurers – recognise the importance of the salvage industry because they say so publicly and all of us agree that the salvage industry needs to be sustainable economically. But there are tensions and frictions, particularly with property insurers – often around costs – and we ask that, when considering salvage awards, owners and insurers celebrate the value preserved by our services and do not focus on the cost. Income from all sources for ISU members in 2023 was $398m. That is a gross figure from which all of the salvors’ costs must be met. Income for emergency response activity was $196m. By contrast the International Union of Marine Insurance reported that premium income for hull and cargo lines in 2022 (latest figures) was $29bn. It is the key priority of the ISU that we should ensure that the industry remains adequately funded. The ISU position is that awards under Article 13 of the Salvage Convention must remain the cornerstone of the industry to fund the investment in people, training and equipment that is needed to continue to provide professional services around the world. At the same time we recognise that our members are free to contract how they wish and many services are provided, for example, under variants of BIMCO wreck contracts, towage contracts and on commercial terms. The need for increased transparency is another area on which we agree. It is closely linked to trust. Over the past two years, ISU worked with Lloyd’s and others to try to find ways to increase the use of the Lloyd’s Open Form salvage agreement. And, though it is fair to say we did not always like the process, ISU moved its position to agree to the provision of settlement data and Environmental, Social and Governance data for each LOF: the contractors have shown willingness to play their part in improving transparency despite our serious reservations. Much of this is now reflected in the new edition of the contract, LOF 2024 as well as changes to the salvage arbitration procedure, with which ISU also has seriou