PERU fishing with guts to report…
Illegal fishing is being revealed to the general public thanks to the initiative of two NGOs have launched the first global monitoring system able to track large fishing vessels anywhere in the world, with the help of satellite data SpaceQuest and technology of Google.
The prototype of this new tool to combat illegal fishing, called "Global Fishing Watch" (global system for monitoring fishing), it was announced today at the World Parks Congress IUCN held in Sydney.
The project is led by the marine conservation group Oceana and the software was developed by SkyTruth, a small nonprofit that specializes in the use of remote sensing technologies to map environmentally sensitive activities organization.
Oceana estimated that the costs of illegal activity fleet losses amount to between USD 10,000 gloables million and USD 23,000 million a year, says The Verge.
“Global Fishing Watch” allows anyone with an Internet connection to check live and free of charge, the trajectories of more than 140,000 boats and see where they were during the last year.
“Then, one can actually see someone fishing in a matter of hours or days”Told Wired Jackie Savitz, Oceana's vice president for oceans campaigner US. This is fast enough to act if they are illegal activities going on, such as a marine protected area.
The system uses data from the Automatic Identification System (AIS) which applies to vessels over 300 gross tons. The AIS transmits information on the identity, type, location, course and speed of a ship every 2-20 seconds, every 3-6 minutes, are anchored.
It is illegal for ships AIS disable or use a false identity.
Proponents of the initiative say they have discovered a “algorithm behavior” allowing them to add to the list vessels “behave as fishing vessels despite the way they identify themselves”.
The new system can detect when the AIS illegally disconnects because blanks are produced in the vessel track.
Paul Woods, SkyTruth, acknowledges that the system records some non-fishing activities as false positives.
However, some say that false negatives are the most important. The "Global Fishing Watch" system still covers most of the activity of so-called illegal fleet: Small fishing boats are not required to use AIS and unscrupulous fishermen off their radios before entering restricted areas.
However, the model is capable of detecting AIS transmissions erratic Savitz notes. “If we see the "pings" each time a ship for a month, then disappear, then suddenly re-appear weeks later, we can take that into account and possibly take action against him for failing to properly transfer”He explains.
It can also be used to identify intermittent activity in nearly 6,600 marine protected areas or reserves around the world where the fishing is prohibited.
“In addition to providing near real-time window of the international activities of commercial fishing fleets in the world, the "Global Fishing Watch" system also enables citizens to help identify illegal fishing vessels”, highlights the conservation group.
SOURCE: Fis.com
