Where is the Naftemporiki Shipping Conference held?

The Naftemporiki Shipping Conference is held in the city of Athens, GRC.

What is the primary focus of this conference?

The conference focuses on key issues and developments within the global shipping industry, bringing together stakeholders to discuss challenges and opportunities in the maritime sector.

10th Naftemporiki Shipping Conference

Name: 10th Naftemporiki Shipping Conference
Start: 2026-05-20T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-05-20T00:00:00Z
Location: Athens

May 20, 2026Athens, GreeceIn-person

Registration open

The Naftemporiki Shipping Conference, held in Athens, GRC, serves as a significant forum for discussions on the global shipping industry. This event brings together key stakeholders to address contemporary challenges and opportunities within the maritime sector. Its location in GRC, a nation with a rich seafaring tradition, underscores its relevance to international shipping dynamics.

Committees & topics

Topics
Geopolitics at Sea: Shipping Between Global Powers · Greece as an Energy Hub · Decarbonization: No More Illusions · Ports, Shipbuilding & Logistics · Dry Bulk Shipping: Shipowners' Strategies in a New Era · The Tanker View: Shipowners' Strategies in a New Era

Why it matters

The conference is particularly important for understanding the evolving landscape of global trade and logistics. Shipping remains the backbone of international commerce, and events like this provide crucial insights into regulatory changes, technological advancements, and geopolitical influences affecting maritime operations. The discussions often highlight the interconnectedness of global economies and the critical role shipping plays in maintaining supply chains and facilitating cross-border movement of goods.

Furthermore, the conference's focus on current trends allows participants to anticipate future shifts in the industry. Topics such as decarbonization, digitalization, and crew welfare are frequently on the agenda, reflecting the sector's commitment to sustainability and efficiency. For those engaged in international relations and economic policy, the outcomes and consensus from such gatherings can inform strategic planning and policy development related to trade, environmental regulations, and maritime security.

How to prepare

To effectively engage with the discussions at the Naftemporiki Shipping Conference, it is essential to conduct thorough preparatory work. Begin by identifying the key themes and sub-topics that are likely to dominate the agenda. Given the location in GRC, understanding the specific interests and perspectives of major shipping nations, such as GRC itself, as well as significant trading partners and maritime powers, is crucial. This involves researching their national maritime policies, economic dependencies on shipping, and their stances on international regulations.

Consider utilizing frameworks like "what-is-stakeholder-mapping" to identify the various actors present at the conference, including shipowners, operators, regulators, technology providers, and financial institutions. Understanding their respective interests and potential points of collaboration or contention will enhance your ability to participate meaningfully. Additionally, reviewing recent developments in maritime law, environmental policies, and global trade agreements will provide a solid foundation for engaging in informed dialogue. Lessons on "dynamic-analysis" can help in understanding the forces shaping the industry, while "engagement-strategies" can guide effective interaction with diverse participants.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 3 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Greece

A leading maritime nation, GRC is deeply invested in the future of global shipping, advocating for policies that support its extensive fleet and maritime expertise.

Role in topic

GRC hosts this significant conference, reflecting its historical and ongoing prominence in the global shipping industry. Its shipowners control a substantial portion of the world's merchant fleet, making its perspective on regulatory frameworks, technological adoption, and market dynamics highly influential.

China

A major global trade power, CHN's perspective is shaped by its vast manufacturing and export capabilities, and its growing maritime fleet.

Role in topic

As the world's largest trading nation and a significant shipbuilder, CHN's views on trade routes, port development, and the demand for shipping services are critical. Its strategic initiatives, such as the Belt and Road Initiative, have profound implications for global maritime logistics.

United States

The USA maintains a strong interest in maritime security, freedom of navigation, and the economic implications of global trade.

Role in topic

The USA's role often revolves around international maritime law, security, and environmental regulations. Its influence stems from its economic power and its strategic naval presence, impacting global shipping lanes and trade policies.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Geopolitics at Sea: Shipping Between Global Powers

Maritime trade carries roughly 80% of global goods by volume, but the sea lanes that sustain it are increasingly contested. Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine triggered Western sanctions, an EU/G7 oil price cap, and the rise of a 'shadow fleet' of opaquely owned tankers moving Russian crude, fragmenting the once-unified tanker market. Simultaneously, U.S.–China strategic competition has spilled into shipping through tariffs, export controls on dual-use maritime technology, and proposed U.S. port fees on Chinese-built vessels, raising the prospect of a bifurcated shipbuilding and registry landscape. Chokepoints have become flashpoints. Houthi attacks in the Red Sea since late 2023 have diverted a large share of Suez traffic around the Cape of Good Hope, lengthening voyages and tightening tonne-mile demand. Drought-driven transit cuts at the Panama Canal, tensions in the Strait of Hormuz, and incidents around the Taiwan Strait and Baltic subsea cables underscore how thin the margin of maritime security has become. For Greek owners, who control the world's largest merchant fleet by deadweight, navigating sanctions compliance, flag-state politics, and route risk is now a core commercial discipline. The policy debate centers on whether the post-1945 freedom-of-navigation order can be preserved, or whether shipping is entering a more transactional era in which trade flows, fleets, and yards align with geopolitical blocs. Outcomes will shape insurance, financing, charter parties, and the strategic value of neutral maritime nations.

Key players

Greece as an Energy Hub

Greece's energy posture has been transformed by Europe's effort to decouple from Russian hydrocarbons after 2022. The Revithoussa LNG terminal near Athens and, since 2024, the Alexandroupolis Floating Storage and Regasification Unit have made Greece a principal entry point for U.S. and other non-Russian LNG into Southeast Europe, feeding the Interconnector Greece–Bulgaria (IGB) and onward markets in the Balkans, Moldova, and Ukraine. The TAP pipeline carrying Azerbaijani gas from the Turkish border to Italy, and the Greece–North Macedonia interconnector, reinforce Greece's role as a transit corridor. Beyond gas, Greece is positioning itself in the electricity space through cross-border interconnections — the planned EuroAsia Interconnector to Cyprus and Israel, the GREGY/Elica link to Egypt, and high-voltage links to Italy and Bulgaria — that could turn the country into an electricity bridge between North Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean, and the EU. Offshore wind ambitions in the Aegean and Ionian, alongside renewed hydrocarbon exploration west and south of Crete, add a domestic supply dimension. The strategic question is whether Greece can convert geographic advantage into durable hub status, given regional disputes over maritime boundaries with Turkey, financing constraints for large interconnectors, and the EU's accelerating shift away from fossil molecules toward electrons and hydrogen.

Key players

Decarbonization: No More Illusions

Shipping accounts for nearly 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and the regulatory framework around it has tightened sharply. In 2023 the International Maritime Organization adopted a revised GHG strategy targeting net-zero 'by or around' 2050, with indicative checkpoints of at least 20% cuts by 2030 and 70% by 2040 against 2008 levels. In 2025 IMO member states agreed in principle on a global fuel standard and an economic measure (effectively a price on marine GHG emissions) — the first sector-wide carbon pricing mechanism, pending formal adoption. In parallel, the EU has brought shipping into its Emissions Trading System and applied the FuelEU Maritime regulation on fuel GHG intensity. The operational reality is more complex than the targets suggest. Alternative fuels — LNG, methanol, ammonia, biofuels, and eventually hydrogen — each carry trade-offs in availability, cost, safety, and lifecycle emissions. Bunkering infrastructure is nascent, green fuel premiums remain large, and the orderbook still skews toward conventional and dual-fuel tonnage. Owners face the prospect of stranded assets if they bet wrong, while charterers and cargo owners are only beginning to internalize the cost of compliance. The debate is shifting from whether to decarbonize to how the burden is shared between flag states, port states, owners, and end consumers, and whether the IMO measure will preempt or coexist with regional schemes like the EU ETS.

Key players

Ports, Shipbuilding & Logistics

Global port and shipbuilding capacity has become a strategic asset. China now accounts for over half of world newbuild deliveries by tonnage, with South Korea and Japan splitting most of the remainder, leaving European yards focused on specialized vessels. Long lead times — slots at top yards are sold out into 2028 — combined with elevated newbuild prices have constrained fleet renewal precisely as decarbonization demands it. The U.S. Trade Representative's investigation into Chinese maritime, logistics, and shipbuilding practices has raised the prospect of port fees on Chinese-built ships calling at U.S. ports, a measure that would reverberate through chartering markets. Port infrastructure is similarly contested. Chinese terminal operators, notably COSCO Shipping Ports, hold concessions across Europe including Piraeus, Hamburg, and Valencia, prompting EU screening of foreign investment in critical infrastructure. The Red Sea diversions, near-shoring trends, and the rise of intermediate hubs (Tanger Med, Khalifa Port, Piraeus) are reshaping liner networks. Digitalization, automation, and cybersecurity have moved from optional to existential after high-profile attacks on terminal operators and shipping lines. For Greece, the Piraeus container hub and a cluster of ferry, repair, and offshore-service yards make port and logistics policy a question of both economic development and sovereignty.

Key players

Dry Bulk Shipping: Shipowners' Strategies in a New Era

Dry bulk shipping — the movement of iron ore, coal, grain, bauxite, and minor bulks — remains tightly coupled to Chinese industrial demand, which absorbs roughly 70% of seaborne iron ore. The post-pandemic period has been characterized by volatile but generally constructive freight rates, helped by Red Sea rerouting, Panama Canal restrictions, and a historically low orderbook as a share of the fleet. At the same time, Chinese property-sector weakness has tempered steel demand, while energy transition trends weigh on the long-term outlook for thermal coal. New trade patterns are emerging. Bauxite exports from Guinea to China have become a major tonne-mile driver, Brazilian iron ore and grain volumes continue to grow, and grain flows have reorganized around the Black Sea after Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the collapse of the Black Sea Grain Initiative. Shipowners — with Greek interests prominent in Capesize, Kamsarmax, and Ultramax segments — face strategic choices on fleet age profile, fuel optionality, and whether to lock in long-term charters or stay exposed to spot volatility. The debate centers on how to invest under deep uncertainty: ordering scarce and expensive newbuilds with uncertain fuel pathways, extending the life of existing tonnage under tightening Carbon Intensity Indicator (CII) rules, or pursuing consolidation and pool structures.

Key players

The Tanker View: Shipowners' Strategies in a New Era

Tanker markets have been redrawn by sanctions and conflict. The G7/EU oil price cap and bans on Russian crude and product imports have rerouted Russian barrels toward India, China, and Turkey, lengthening voyages and bifurcating the fleet into a compliant mainstream market and a sanctioned 'shadow' segment estimated in the high hundreds of vessels. Red Sea attacks have pushed product and crude tankers around Africa, further tightening tonne-mile supply, while OPEC+ production policy and U.S. shale output set the underlying volume backdrop. Demand drivers are also shifting. Atlantic Basin crude — U.S., Brazilian, and Guyanese barrels — increasingly heads to Asia, supporting VLCC and Suezmax demand. Product tanker markets benefit from refinery dislocations: closures in OECD markets and new mega-refineries in the Middle East, China, and Africa (Dangote) are lengthening clean and dirty product trades. The orderbook has risen from historic lows but remains modest relative to an aging fleet, and uncertainty over future fuels constrains ordering. Shipowners — with Greek owners controlling a substantial share of the global crude and product tanker fleet — must weigh sanctions compliance risk, exposure to shadow-fleet displacement, the timing of fleet renewal, and how to position for a peak-oil demand horizon that keeps being pushed out.

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for 10th Naftemporiki Shipping Conference.

Recent reporting to ground your prep

Cardinals Chase Fourth Win vs Struggling Ast

China's New Strategy for Taiwan and Japan

Ukraine Drone Strikes Crimea Power Grid

Anta's Rise

Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Engagement Strategies

Hidden Stakeholders

Dynamic Analysis

Stakeholder Mapping Workshop

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

Conflict Resolution

Greece May 2026

By committee

Frequently asked questions

10th Naftemporiki Shipping Conference

May 20, 2026Athens, GreeceIn-person

Registration open

Committees & topics

Topics
Geopolitics at Sea: Shipping Between Global Powers · Greece as an Energy Hub · Decarbonization: No More Illusions · Ports, Shipbuilding & Logistics · Dry Bulk Shipping: Shipowners' Strategies in a New Era · The Tanker View: Shipowners' Strategies in a New Era

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 3 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Greece

A leading maritime nation, GRC is deeply invested in the future of global shipping, advocating for policies that support its extensive fleet and maritime expertise.

Role in topic

China

A major global trade power, CHN's perspective is shaped by its vast manufacturing and export capabilities, and its growing maritime fleet.

Role in topic

United States

The USA maintains a strong interest in maritime security, freedom of navigation, and the economic implications of global trade.

Role in topic

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.