Canada will help the Philippines in detecting illegal fishing in the country's waters using Ottawa's dark vessel tracking system under a new agreement signed last October 12, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said Monday.

In a press release, the DFA said Philippine Ambassador to Canada Maria Andrelita Austria and Canadian Assistant Deputy Minister Adam Burns of the Programs Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO), signed the Arrangement on the Dark Vessel Detection (DVD) System between NCWC and the DFO of Canada.

According to DFA, the DVD System is a program used to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing (IUUF) by vessels who deliberately turn off their Automatic Identification System (AIS). It utilizes layered multi-sensor satellite data from both commercial and government-owned satellite assets to provide near real-time satellite imagery. It incorporates historical vessel information, environmental data, and analytics to support and facilitate analysis.

"The system will be jointly managed by the NCWC and Canada’s DFO and aims to bolster the Philippines’ fight against IUUF and enhance its maritime domain awareness over its territorial waters and Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ)," the statement reads.