World Sailing and ICOMIA join forces

World Sailing, the world governing body of the sport, and ICOMIA, the global voice of the recreational marine industry, have joined forces to ensure a sustainable future for the sport.World Sailing and ICOMIA have a shared vision to grow the number of people who participate at the highest level of the sport, all the way down to grassroots and recreational sailing, whilst safeguarding the environment and accelerating innovation.As part of a signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), World Sailing and ICOMIA will collaborate on a variety of common interest areas such as:-       Vessel recycling and life cycle assessment-       Hybrid propulsion-       Sustainable maintenance regimes and emerging legislationUnder the MOU, both organisations will share statistics and data to help focus participation drives as well as allowing attendance and participation at the respective annual conferences. Through the agreement, both organisations aim to achieve their mission of increasing the number of people who are active on the water.On the agreement, Dan Reading, World Sailing’s Head of Sustainability, commented, “We cross paths with ICOMIA regularly when lobbying at an international level for the benefit of recreational boating.“This includes the International Maritime Organisation where we are both strategic partners on a current project addressing biofouling.“By joining forces to strengthen the link between the marine industry with end users, we can be more effective in creating a more sustainable sector.”Udo Kleinitz, Secretary General of ICOMIA added, “By formalising the strategic partnership with World Sailing, our organisations acknowledge the benefits of the knowledge, resources and positively increasing the industry’s profile. I am delighted about achieving this major achievement together with World Sailing and look forward to increasing the rate of our outputs serving our members.”ICOMIA is an international association, whose full members are global marine industry associations. ICOMIA is a longstanding stakeholder in the various relevant working groups of the EU Commission and employs technical and environmental specialists who are already engaged in EU related work. Its mission is to act as the global voice of the recreational marine industry worldwide to facilitate, influence, inform and research.World Sailing is the world governing body for the sport of sailing, officially recognised by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Paralympic Committee (IPC).Founded in 1907, World Sailing’s vision is for a world in which millions more people fall in love with sailing; inspired by the unique relationship between sport, technology and the forces of nature; we all work to protect the waters of the world.World Sailing is made up of 144 Member National Authorities, the national governing bodies for sailing around the world and 117 World Sailing Class Associations.For more info on ICOMIA visit www.icomia.orgFor more info on World Sailing visit www.sailing.org or contact marketing@sailing.org