UKHO completes ENC coverage of China

AVCS now includes coverage of the Chinese mainland as far as the Pearl River, the Coast of Hainan Island and some of China’s busiest ports including Shanghai, Shenzhen and Qingdao.

In total the UKHO has now released 375 Chinese ENCs covering the huge area of Chinese coastal waters and all the country’s major ports. The new charts are being made available under a unique agreement between the UKHO and its respected colleagues, the Chinese Naval Guarantee Department (NGD). These charts are only available through Admiralty, making AVCS the only ENC service to provide worldwide coverage.

In total, AVCS now provides official berth-to-berth coverage between 2,165 trading ports worldwide and more than 10,613 charts. ENCs are available on flexible three-, six-, nine- and 12-month licensing terms. All come with the added assurance of instant access via the Admiralty remote licensing facility and weekly updating service, both online and on CD.

These figures have been achieved two years ahead of the UKHO’s commitment to provide AVCS coverage of 2,000 ports by 2012. The benchmark has been made possible with the support of many hydrographic offices worldwide and, in this instance, the productive relationship established between the UKHO and the NGD.

The ENCs for China enable shipping companies operating in the region to easily and immediately satisfy ECDIS carriage requirements for electronic charts, a key step in meeting the changing operational and compliance requirements brought about by the transition from paper to digital navigation.

Zheng Mianshen, senior superintendent of China Shipping Development Co. Ltd, Tanker Co. says: “As one of the first companies in China to trial this ENC provision, we are already seeing the benefit on the vessels that are using it. Any system that helps to improve safety onboard and, in the face of one of the most severe economic downturns in memory, provide additional cost savings must be applauded. Mandatory carriage of ECDIS will be with us as early as 2012, and introducing AVCS now provides us with the necessary timeframe to equip, train and test any system before the regulations are enforced.”

The addition of ENCs for China to the AVCS folio further extends the service’s market-leading coverage. AVCS is now used by more than 675 shipping companies worldwide with more than 60 vessels a week joining the service.

Sweethigh Navigation Technology (SNT) in Shanghai is one of the Admiralty distributors providing the AVCS system to Far Eastern shipping companies as a key part of Admiralty’s portfolio of electronic products and services. Changzhe Wu, marketing & sales manager says: “The introduction of ENCs for this part of the world is a welcome addition to safe and efficient navigation. The waterways around major ports such as Shanghai and Singapore are some of the busiest in the world and an AVCS-equipped bridge provides the tools that allow mariners to navigate these passages in the safest manner possible. We are already seeing strong interest in AVCS and other Admiralty digital products and anticipate a significant uptake of the latest Chinese ENCs.”

Mike Robinson, UKHO chief executive says “The completion of coastal coverage for China and more than 10,000 ENCs in total is a fantastic achievement and testament to the cooperation and efforts of hydrographic offices throughout the world. Maritime navigation is undergoing a fundamental change as it moves from paper to digital technology, and a critical factor in making that transition successfully requires mariners and shore-based teams to have the utmost confidence in the products and services they use. That’s why a central element of our vision for the future of navigation is providing the high standard of global ENC data today’s mariners and shipping companies need and can rely on to make safe and efficient berth-to-berth voyages.”