The Information Society S.A. was appointed as the Intermediate Management Entity (IM) for the implementation of part of the Operational Programme (OP) Fisheries and Maritime Affairs 2014-2020.

In particular, it shall be responsible for the management of measure 6.6.1 “Control and Enforcement” and in particular for the action “Development, purchase and installation of the necessary elements, including hardware and software, to ensure the transmission of data from operators involved in fisheries and trade in fishery products to both national and EU authorities, including the necessary elements for electronic recording and reporting systems (ERS), vessel monitoring systems (VMS-VMS) and cluster systems (VMS).

This Action concerns the inflexible obligation of professional fishermen and owners (as defined in Reg. 508/2014) of fishing vessels belonging to the categories of beneficiaries, to carry on board their vessels the electronic devices for satellite tracking and transmission of VMS-ERS-AIS data, as appropriate.
This obligation arises from the Community institutional framework referred to in the above paragraph and the Member State (MS) shall comply and harmonise its national framework to ensure more effective control methods on its territory.

The beneficiaries of the financial support will be:

• natural or legal persons, owners (as defined in Reg. 508/2014) of fishing vessels engaged in professional fishing on board an active fishing vessel (valid professional fishing licence). The vessels for which the owners will be supported should be registered in the Greek Registers/Lamboldia and registered in the National Fishing Register (NAM), as well as meet all the requirements of the Community and National legislation governing commercial fishing vessels, taking into account any time commitments from previous funding of the same operations at the time of application.
• Any person who voluntarily or compulsorily, under the applicable legislation, equips a fishing vessel with a valid licence with monitoring, recording and reporting information systems in order to meet the requirements for special fishing permits, such as the fishing of holothurians and sympatric shrimps.
• Perpetual beneficiaries are also the old obligated users of the devices by replacing the old ones, taking into account any time commitments resulting from previous funding.
• Fishermen with commercial fishing vessels of 12 metres or more in length.
• Fishermen with a licence to fish in international waters.
• Fishermen with a bluefin tuna licence (BFT), and/or a swordfish licence (SWO) and/or a longfin tuna licence (ALB).
• Fishermen with a purse seine or seining licence (SB) of less than 12 metres in length.

The financial aid will be granted to the beneficiary in the form of a grant and its amount will be calculated on the basis of eligible costs. This Action will be applied throughout the Greek territory, with aid intensities varying accordingly:

• the size of the businessvvv
• the location of the beneficiaries of the operations and whether they are implemented on the “remote Greek islands”
• if the beneficiaries and the beneficiary fishing vessels are related to small-scale coastal fishing.

Co-financed by Greece and the European Union