Footnote wa) of RR Appendix 18 -edition 2016, does not give CEPT administrations any protection against a regional system. A way to mitigate the problem would to clearly announced that Europe will not implemented the VDES regional on the channels 80, 21, 81, 22, 82, 23 and 83 of RR Appendix 18 and will solely implemented the worldwide harmonised VDES terrestrial system on the channels 24, 84, 25, 85, 26 and 86 of RR Appendix 18.
MAR FG agreed in May 2017 to propose to the next Working Group Frequency Management (WG FM) that the deliverable should be an ECC Decision. The ECC meeting in November 2107 endorsed the development of an ECC Decision.
This work is expected to lead to one new combined ECC Decision together with the work under Maritime FG 08.
WG FM#92 (October 2018) approved the new draft ECC Decision (19)03 on the harmonised usage of the channels of theRadio Regulations Appendix 18 (transmitting frequencies in the VHF maritimemobile band) for public consultation. An informative cover letter will be sentout together with the draft Decision in the consultation process.