Icelandic tech company Trackwell will provide Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) services for Commonwealth commercial fisheries to manage the activity of commercial fishing vessels and ensure continuous compliance with fisheries management regulations.
The deal is the result of a tender issued by the Commonwealth of Australia, operating as the Australian Fisheries Management Authority (AFMA) and will provide AFMA with enhanced monitoring and alerting options for thousands of commercial fishing vessels required to carry an operational VMS unit. Vessel movements can be monitored and the positional data received from the system used to analyse the vessels’ behaviour for law enforcement and resource management purposes.
Jón Ingi Björnsson, CEO of Trackwell, said: “The contract expands our operations to the Indian and Southern Oceans, further extending and strengthening our presence in the Pacific.”
Constant tracking
Australian-licenced fishing vessels can be tracked wherever they operate and messages will be exchanged with other state and regional fishery offices in accordance with regulations and bi-lateral agreements. Automatic monitoring tools include the timely reception of position reports and the detection of fishery regulation breaches.
The system will maintain compatibility with current MTU (Mobile Transceiver Unit) hardware installed on each vessel monitored by AFMA while accommodating new MTU solutions endorsed for use by each state and territory fisheries agency. The system will also support future integration and compatibility with the Fisheries Language for Universal Exchange (FLUX) system to assist and support the distribution of fisheries-related data.
