Funding for the GloBallast Partnerships project, to assist developing countries in reducing the transfer of harmful aquatic organisms in ships' ballast water, has been approved by the intergovernmental Council of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), enabling the project to enter an exciting new phase. The main objective of GloBallast Partnerships (full title: Building Partnerships to Assist Developing Countries to Reduce the Transfer of Harmful Aquatic Organisms in Ships' Ballast Water) is to assist particularly vulnerable countries and/or regions to enact legal, policy and institutional reforms to meet the objectives of the International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships' Ballast Water and Sediments (BWM convention), adopted by IMO in February 2004.