RECALLING Article 38(a) of the Convention on the International
Maritime Organization concerning the functions of the Marine Environment
Protection Committee conferred upon it by the international conventions
for the prevention and control of marine pollution,
RECALLING ALSO that the International Conference on Ballast
Water Management for Ships held in February 2004 adopted the International
Convention for the Control and Management of Ships' Ballast Water
and Sediments, 2004 (the Ballast Water Management Convention) together
with four conference resolutions,
NOTING that regulation A-2 of
the Ballast Water Management Convention requires that discharge of
ballast water shall only be conducted through ballast water management
in accordance with the provisions of the Annex to the Convention,
NOTING ALSO that regulation B-5.2 of
the Ballast Water Management Convention provides that ships constructed
in or after 2009 should, without compromising safety or operational
efficiency, be designed and constructed with a view to minimize the
uptake and undesirable entrapment of sediments, facilitate removal
of sediments, and provide safe access to allow for sediment removal
and sampling taking into account the guidelines developed by the Organization,
NOTING FURTHER resolution MEPC.150(55) by which the Committee adopted the Guidelines on design and
construction to facilitate sediment control on ships (G12) and resolved
to keep these guidelines under review,
HAVING CONSIDERED, at its sixty-third session, a revised
text of the Guidelines on design and construction to facilitate sediment
control on ships (G12), developed by the Ballast Water Review Group
of the Committee at its sixty-second session,
1 ADOPTS the 2012 Guidelines on design and construction
to facilitate sediment control on ships (G12), as set out in the Annex
to this resolution;
2 INVITES Member Governments to apply the 2012
Guidelines (G12) as soon as possible or when the Convention becomes
applicable to them; and