RECALLING Article 15(j) of the Convention on the International
Maritime Organization concerning the functions of the Assembly in
relation to regulations and guidelines concerning maritime safety,
RECALLING ALSO regulations IV/7.1.1,
7.1.2 and 14.1 of the 1988
amendments to the International Convention for the Safety of Life
at Sea (SOLAS), 1974, concerning radiocommunications for the global
maritime distress and safety system (GMDSS), which require respectively
that ships be provided with a VHF radio installation capable of voice
communication and digital selective calling and that such VHF radio
installations shall conform to appropriate performance standards not
inferior to those adopted by the Organization,
RECOGNIZING the need to prepare performance standards for
VHF radio installations capable of voice communication and digital
selective calling to be used in the GMDSS in order to ensure the operational
reliability of such equipment and to avoid, as far as practicable,
adverse interaction between such equipment and other communication
and navigation equipment on board ship,
HAVING CONSIDERED the recommendation made by the Maritime
Safety Committee at its sixty-fifth session,
1. ADOPTS the Recommendation on Performance Standards
for Shipborne VHF Radio Installations Capable of Voice Communication
and Digital Selective Calling set out in the annex to the present
resolution;
2. RECOMMENDS Governments to ensure that shipborne
VHF radio installations capable of voice communication and digital
selective calling which will form part of the GMDSS:
-
(a) if installed on or after 23 November 1996,
conform to performance standards not inferior to those specified in
the annex to the present resolution;
-
(b) if installed before 23 November 1996, conform
to performance standards not inferior to those specified in the annex
to resolution A.609(15);
3. REQUESTS the Maritime Safety Committee to keep
these Performance Standards under review and to adopt amendments thereto,
as necessary.