About Indo-Pacific Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA)
- The Indo-Pacific Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA) is a Quad-led initiative launched during the Quad Leaders’ Summit in Tokyo in May 2022.
- The initiative was introduced to track "dark shipping", vessels that switch off tracking systems to evade detection and to build a faster, broader and more accurate maritime surveillance network across the Indo-Pacific region.
- Three strategic sub-regions of the Indo-Pacific are targeted under this initiative: the Pacific Islands, Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).
Purpose and Functions of IPMDA
- The primary objective of IPMDA is to enhance maritime domain awareness and bring greater transparency to critical sea lanes of the Indo-Pacific region.
- It is a technology and training initiative that uses advanced tools like commercial satellite radio frequency (RF) data to monitor and detect maritime activity in near real-time.
- Through this, IPMDA aims to provide partner countries in Southeast Asia, Pacific, and IOR with timely and actionable maritime intelligence to protect their exclusive economic zones (EEZs).
Details of the U.S. Approval to India
- The United States has approved a potential sale of maritime surveillance technology worth $131 million to India. The deal includes:
- SeaVision software and its enhancements,
- A Technical Assistance Field Team (TAFT) for training,
- Remote software and analytics support, and
- Program documentation and logistics
- SeaVision is a key maritime situational awareness tool widely used for vessel tracking and coastal surveillance.
