Indian Navy hosts Maritime Information Sharing Workshop 2019

The Indian Navy is hosting a Maritime Information Sharing Workshop 2019 edition under the aegis of the Information Fusion Centre-Indian Ocean Region (IFC-IOR) at Gurugram, Harayana. The two-day event was inaugurated by Vice Admiral MS Pawar, Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff in 12 June 2019.

Key Highlights

Participants: More than 41 delegates from 29 countries of Indian Ocean Region (IOR) and beyond participated in the workshop.

During the MISW 2019 event Deputy Chief of Naval Staff stressed the need for greater maritime collaboration and for developing bonds based on trust between partner countries in IOR. He also requested delegates to participate actively in MISW.

Several talks regarding contemporary maritime challenges in Indo-Pacific region and highlighting significance of maritime domain as well as the challenges faced by region were held at the event.

Purpose: In course of 2 days, the MISW aims to acquaint all participants about IFC-IOR and its information sharing mechanisms. It also aims to promote sharing of best practices in this field so as to yield better response to myriad security and safety challenges that IOR faces.

Issues undertaken: participants would look into issues such as piracy, maritime terrorism, humanitarian assistance & disaster relief, human & drug trafficking as well as legal perspective of combating these challenges.

The delegates would also participate in an information sharing exercise scheduled on 13 June 2019. This is to practice and validate some of the concepts and procedures that have been evolved during workshop.

About Information Fusion Centre Indian Ocean Region (IFC-IOR)

Background: It was launched on 22 December 2018 by then Honourable Raksha Mantri Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman, at Information Management and Analysis Centre (IMAC) Gurugram, Haryana.

Objective: The aim was to work closely with multi-national constructs and other information fusion centres so as to further maritime security and safety in Indian Ocean Region.

Need: With over 75% of world’s maritime trade and 50% of global oil consumption passing through Indian Ocean Region, the region is vital to world trade and economic prosperity of many nations.

Mandate: It works towards capability building in IOR, coordinating in time incident response and disaster relief, and also sharing submarine safety information.

So far the centre has established linkages with more than 16 countries and 13 international maritime security agencies.

Month: Current Affairs - June, 2019