News / US sanction threat to countries that sign up to IMO bid for greener shipping

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Amid falling North American trade and market share, President Trump is threatening more sanctions on China and the rest of the world ahead of tomorrow’s MEPC meeting on shipping decarbonisation. 

In a recent joint statement, US secretary of state Marco Rubio, energy secretary Chris Wright and transport secretary Sean Duffy said countries voting “yes” to the International Maritime Organization’s net zero framework to decarbonise shipping could face sanctions. 

Such measures from the US could include port fees or blocked entry for vessels flagged, owned or operated from said countries, as well as visa restrictions. 

“The proposal poses significant risks to the global economy and subjects not just Americans, but all IMO member states, to an unsanctioned global tax regime that levies punitive and regressive financial penalties,” they said. 

The IMO’s net zero framework must be adopted by a two-thirds majority of the parties to the convention, present and voting. There are 108 such parties, representing more than 97% of the world’s merchant shipping fleet by tonnage. 

At the IMO conference during London Shipping Week, secretary general Arsenio Dominguez said he was “very confident” the framework would be adopted, but Toby Royal, partner at law firm Watson Farley and Williams, warned that the current US position arguably “undermines the IMO’s authority”, and could stall momentum towards decarbonisation. 

Mr Royal explained: “As one of the world’s largest economies and maritime trading nations, US non-alignment poses a risk of fragmenting international consensus.” 

And in a further move that could fragment international ties, President Trump took to Truth Social and threatened to reinstate the 100% tariff on imports from China in response to the newly announced export controls on rare earth minerals from China. 

The implementation date is said to be 1 November, ahead of the 34% tariffs set to go back into effect on 10 November after the pause. And yesterday, Beijing signalled it would retaliate against any new levies. 

As a result of the trade war, Sea-Intelligence found that, while global container demand growth “remained steady” in August, the sharp decline in North American (NAM) container demand meant the continent saw a global market share drop of 2.5%. 

Graph: Sea-Intelligence

Global container demand grew 2.8% year on year in August, based on Container Trades Statistics (CTS) loaded volume data, but demand growth in the world, exclusive of NAM, averaged 6.3% in 2025 year-to-date.  

“It can be seen how NAM growth drops sharply as the trade war is initiated,” said Sea-Intelligence.  

Indeed, August saw a drop in NAM volumes of 9%, due to a 7% decline in exports and 9.9% fewer imports. 

By way of comparison, the decline of NAM imports and exports during the height of Covid in March/April 2020 was 13.6% and 16.7% respectively.  

By examining the ratio of NAM cargo of the total teu shipped globally, imports and exports, in August, the maritime analyst calculated that NAM’s global market share declined 2.5%, to 24%.

Graph: Sea-Intelligence

“There is really only one very clear conclusion to be drawn from the data. The trade war has a substantial and material negative impact on container volumes related to NAM,” said Sea-Intelligence analysts.  

And they warned that as the CTS data covered cargo loaded in the full month of August, the full impact of the re-instatement of the reciprocal tariffs was yet to be seen. 

“As such, a further negative development can be expected when data from September are released.”