Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt from a European Commission Impact Assessment, “Better situational awareness by enhanced cooperation across maritime surveillance authorities: next steps within the Common Information Sharing Environment for the EU maritime domain.” The complete document is available here.
From: Secretary-General of the European Commission
4. PROBLEM DEFINITION
4.1.The problem
The increasing challenges, threats risks and vulnerabilities(28) that the EU maritime domain is exposed to is putting additional burdens on the up to 400 relevant maritime surveillance authorities of the EU Member States to ensure the safety and security of the EU and its population.
28 These can take many forms, such as natural catastrophes – storm floodings or tsunamis; security of supply related to minerals, foodstuff, seafood and energy; risks to underwater pipelines and cables through anchors, fishing gear or others; poor safety regulation of wind, wave and tidal energy farms; unintended accidents; illegal discharge of oil at sea; piracy; terrorism; local wars; illegal immigration; safety of life at sea; narcotics and arms trafficking; smuggling of (counterfeit) goods – considering that 70% of the EU’s external trade is carried by sea and that stand alone cigarette smuggling constitutes a loss of public income of about € 10 billion each year; importation of alien species in (polluted) ballast waters, plundering of natural resources such as overfishing; plundering of archaeological artefacts and treasures on the seabed and others.
