The Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (KKP) launched the Integrated Maritime Intelligent Platform in Central Jakarta. The launch represents a crucial step for KKP’s five Blue Economy Programmes to sustain ecological health and support economic growth in coastal communities and the whole nation. Integrated Maritime Intelligent Platform is a command centre and data centre for maritime events. As a policy and decision-making reference for Indonesia’s marine and fisheries industry.
Early preparations for the command centre relied on integrating all existing information systems in the KKP, infrastructure, satellite data, preparing personnel, and establishing monitoring systems. Future additions and improvements will be made to satellite data services to enable the supervision of marine space usage activities.
The events of the command centre will also concentrate on quantifiable fishing policies by monitoring fishery activities in Indonesian waters and detecting any potential violations using satellite data in real-time and on a continuous basis. Through the command centre platform, KKP will be able to respond to difficulties in the marine and fisheries industry in an even more efficient approach.
Indonesia is dedicated to being the leading proponent of sustainable fisheries management that contributes to the economic recovery of the nation. Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan stated that the geostrategic position of the Indonesian sea, which encompasses 6.4 million square kilometres, is quite advantageous.
If Indonesia’s marine and fishery resources are properly managed, their existence can contribute more than 6-7% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). Coordinating Minister Luhut stated that up to four million people will gain from employment and contribute fifty per cent of the marine protein intake for food security.
The Command Centre of the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries was constructed to prevent prospective fishing breaches in real time, he noted. The Command Centre makes use of the Integrated Maritime Intelligent Platform and satellite-based surveillance to monitor and detect fishing vessel activities and thematic spatial data.
Indonesia must address excessive fishing, illicit, unreported, and unregulated fishing, as well as marine pollution. This not only threatens marine resources and ecosystems, but also food security, the economy, and the earnings of marine and fisheries industry workers.
Coordinating Minister Luhut remarked that unlawful activities also lowers confidence in the global fisheries market and investment interest in marine fisheries. In addition, it will impact the government’s goal of achieving sustainable development aspirations and the attainment of a blue economy.
He also thinks that the legislation and its derivatives will concurrently boost national fishing productivity, preserve national investment and fishermen’s welfare, and hasten Indonesia’s goal of becoming a worldwide participant in the fishery industry.
Coordinating Minister Luhut believes that the existence of the Integrated Maritime Intelligent Platform will have a significant impact on the sustainability of the marine ecosystem, the eradication of illegal fishing, and state sovereignty, as well as the growth of non-tax state revenues from the marine and fisheries sector.
Minister of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Sakti Wahyu Trenggono stated that a quota-based measured fishing policy was one of the primary programmes that became the foundation. The KKP has also established a command centre that can monitor fishing activity in Indonesian waters to protect local fishermen in Indonesia’s regulated fishing zones.
The Integrated Maritime Intelligent Platform includes the following components:
- A monitoring feature that monitors the distribution and movement of fishing vessels throughout Indonesian waters based on a vessel monitoring system (VMS);
- An automatic identification system (AIS), a dashboard feature that provides information on key indicators of the Indonesian marine and fisheries sector;
- Alert feature with the function of detecting any suspected violations and providing a quick warning to the command centre.