Note especially:
- 2.1.1. Step 1: Providing the essential border surveillance infrastructure at national level
o During the 2nd half of 2009, FRONTEX will present the risk assessment determining those parts of the external borders of the Member States which should be covered by a national surveillance system […]. At the same time, the different technical concepts for the surveillance of external land and maritime borders elaborated by the contractor of the technical study will be presented to the Member States […] The Commission will consider, in consultation with the Member States whether the concepts and the [European Border Funds] guidelines could become minimum technical requirements to promote interoperability and uniform border surveillance standards, with the possibility for a legislative proposal to be tabled in 2011.
- 2.2.1. Step 4: Research and development to improve the performance of surveillance tools
o 2.2.1.1. Objective: The intention of this step is to promote the use of FP6 and FP7 to improve the performance and use of surveillance tools in order to increase the area covered, the number of suspicious activities detected as well as to improve the identification and tracking of potentially suspicious targets and the access to high resolution observation satellite data.
- 2.2.2. Step 5: Common application of surveillance tools
o 2.2.2.1. Objective: The purpose of this step is the development and setting up of common applications of surveillance tools to provide national coordination centres with surveillance information on their external borders and on the pre-frontier area on a more frequent, reliable and cost-efficient basis. FRONTEX could act as a facilitator in this regard, e.g. via the procurement of satellite imagery on behalf of Member States and co-ordinating the sharing of surveillance equipment such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV).
o 2.2.2.2. Measures taken during the reporting period: In June 2009, the GMES border surveillance group, consisting of experts from the Commission, interested Member States, FRONTEX, ESA, EUSC and EDA, has finalised its work on a concept for the common application of tools for border surveillance, in which it identified the Main user scenarios and requirements for land and maritime border surveillance; State-of-the-art technology to meet these requirements (e.g. airborne and space based surveillance platforms) and applicability of this technology to the different user scenarios.
o 2.2.2.3. Next measures to be taken: […] In 2010, under the FP7 2011 work programme (space theme), a number of projects will be programmed to demonstrate the technical feasibility of the scenarios chosen.
- 2.3.2. Step 8: Creation of a common information sharing environment for the whole EU maritime domain
o 2.3.2.2. Measures taken during the reporting period: In 2008, the EC and ESA started a set of joint initiatives aiming at investigating the possibility of picking up and distributing Automated Identification System (AIS) signals from space. The conclusions of the projects will feed into recommendations for possible next steps towards a common space-borne AIS service by the end of 2010.
- 3. CONCLUSION: […] Concepts and tools developed under Phase 2 (in particular steps 5 and 6) shall be first tested and then progressively inserted into the EUROSUR framework from 2012 onwards.
(Source Eurospace)