Ireland Chooses CLS’ Vessel Monitoring System
- 27 January 2020
- Category: Case Studies, News
CLS recently won an open tender to be the exclusive provider of Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) services for Irish commercial fisheries. The tender was issued by Ireland’s Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority (SFPA). CLS’s solution supports the SFPA and partner agencies to manage activity for all commercial fishing vessels over 12 m under an Irish flag to ensure continuous compliance with fisheries management regulations.
Ireland’s EEZ is subject to Europe’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) that make VMS compulsory for EU vessels above 12m and non-EU vessels of the same size whenever they operate in community waters.
Expanding Operations in Europe
The Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority (SFPA) is the independent statutory body responsible for the regulation of the sea-fisheries and the sea-food production sectors. It promotes compliance with the EU Common Fisheries Policy, sea-fisheries law and food safety law relating to fish and fish products, verifies compliance and, where necessary, enforces it.
Its mandate covers all fishing vessels operating within Ireland’s 200-mile limit, over 2,000 Irish registered fishing vessels wherever they operate and all seafood produced in Ireland’s seafood processing companies. The SFPA operates through a network of regional port offices situated at Ireland’s main fishery harbors. The waters around Ireland contain some of the most productive fishing grounds in the EU.
Through an open tender process for an advanced Vessel Monitoring system, SFPA awarded CLS Fisheries the contract for the interfacing, installation, and activation of the entire Irish-flagged industrial fleet, estimated at 300 vessels. CLS provided its state-of-the-art VMS terminal TRITON, which meets all the requirements of the CFP. CLS Fisheries is now the exclusive VMS provider in Ireland.
“We are thrilled to be working with Ireland, SFPA, and Barry Electronics on this project. For the past 30 years, CLS Fisheries has pioneered VMS technology around the world, working with governments in over 90 countries, and now, for the first time, Ireland. The installation and activation of our Triton VMS has now been completed in over 30 ports, and we’re looking forward to supporting SFPA in its work protecting and monitoring Irish seas.” — Michel Dejean, Director of CLS Fisheries
The Project
CLS delivered the TRITON in record time and then ensured the installation all around the island with its local Partner, Barry Electronics LTD. Barry Electronics is the Largest Marine Electronics company in Ireland with headquarters in the main Fishing port, Killybegs, co. Donegal. CLS experts trained the technical staff at Barry and certified the company as a CLS Service Point, which is the highest level of expertise on its VMS product. All the devices were installed between June and November at multiple fishing ports by trained and audited specialists.
CLS’ TRITON transmitter will provide SFPA with enhanced monitoring and alerts for all the commercial vessels required to carry a VMS unit. It will enable SFPA and its partner agencies to monitor vessel movements and use position, speed, and heading data to analyze vessel behavior for enforcement and resource management.
