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San Marino, Guyana, Sierra Leone, Comoro Islands, Guinea Bissau and most notably Guinea are the flag states that stand out for their extraordinary fleet growth in the latest data compiled in Clarksons Research’s World Fleet Monitor, statistics that highlight the whack-a-mole game authorities in the West are having to fight in their bid to crack down on the growing shadow fleet.
San Marino’s growth will likely raise questions within European circles – its fleet growing by 663% over the past 12 months to 1.1m gt.
Guyana in South America has also been making headlines in recent months, its fleet growing by 576% in the past year to 3.3m gt. The fleet is also notable for its average age, standing above 40 years old.
It is in Africa, however, where flag states have mushroomed the most in step with the growth of the shadow fleet – Sierre Leone up by 105%, the Comoro Islands by 104%, Guinea Bissau leaping by 340%, and most extraordinary of all, Guinea’s flag state growing by 99,094% over the past 12 months.
Another flag that has been in the news a great deal for its shadow fleet links, Barbados, saw its fleet grow by 177% in the past year, according to Clarksons data. Under pressure, the London-headquartered Barbados ship registry has said that by the end of January it will have asked a total of 46 ships to remove the country’s flag as a result of UK sanctions.
The number of vessels hit by sanctions surpassed 1,000 late last year with data from S&P Global Market Intelligence showing that more 800 of these ships do not have confirmed insurance. Moreover, the average age of sanctioned ships – 21 years – is some eight years older than the global average, adding to growing concern that the sprawling so-called shadow fleet could lead to multiple costly environmental catastrophes.
Despite slowing, the grey fleet is still growing by around 10 tankers a month, according to brokers BRS.
Nearly two in three vintage tankers carried Iranian, Venezuelan, or Russian cargoes last year, according to estimates from broker Gibson.
Global insurer Allianz’s 2024 shipping report noted of the shadow fleet: “Despite efforts to crack down on these vessels, the number of tankers is actually increasing, and we have seen a number of groundings and collision incidents.”
In recent weeks the UK has teamed up with a number of north European neighbours to challenge the insurance coverage of vessels heading from Russia through the Baltic and along the English Channel.
Today, some 175 tankers laden with Russian oil transit the Baltic each month, according to Craig Kennedy who runs the Navigating Russia substack and proposed similar Baltic insurance checks in a paper for the Brookings Institution in May last year.
If the insurance verification program is successful in the Baltic, Kennedy has suggested setting up a similar one in the Aegean.
“Together with the Baltic, this would deny Russia the ability to load up to 80% of its oil exports on shadow tankers. Instead, Russia would be compelled to use mainstream tankers, thus increasing the exposure of export revenues to price cap constraints,” Kennedy wrote.
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