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Adapting a project from the airport industry, several governments and organizations plan to initiate a »Collaborative Decision Making« concept and an international »PortCDM« council.

The goal is to support standardized message sharing in port call operations. Swedish »Sea Traffic Management« Validation Project today announced that it initiated a meeting on March 29th, where »leading governmental and non-governmental maritime organizations« will establish the council.

Building on the strategy »Connecting Ships and Ports« issued by IMO for 2017 the project is said to have been highly inspired by the airport CDM council and aims for establishing the necessary overarching guidelines, processes and procedures »to make PortCDM a successful international concept to improve maritime transport as it relates to Port operations and Ports interaction with ships«, it was said.

The concept is implementing processes and procedures as well as the technical infrastructure for the stakeholders at a given port to synchronized approaches and fast turn-around times for visiting vessels by standardized, safe, and secure communication in real-time. Information on intentions of future actions, as well as information about completed actions shared by involved port call actors, is the basis for enhanced coordination among them, resulting in efficient just-in-time operations. »Data sharing between the different actors in a port call improves their situational awareness and planning«, the Swedish organization added.

Given that port operations may be vastly differ between individual ports, the focus of PortCDM is locally driven. It should be developed with local stakeholders. »It is essential that a common framework is defined, which allows for greatest customization to meet each port’s specific needs, and provides enough standardization that ships can move from port to port and best utilize the different implementations of PortCDM.«

The PortCDM council is described as the first governance body released building on the necessity to maintain standards to provide trust for future proof solutions to different service providers and users within the maritime ecosystem. Confirmed participants of the inauguration meeting include organizations recognized as IGOs and NGOs by IMO, shipping organizations and ports as well as industry wide recognized experts in the affected maritime domain.