PHL boosts Bantay Dagat patrols in South China Sea

THE Philippines is beefing up its civilian fishery patrol force to boost maritime monitoring as Chinese activity intensifies in the South China Sea, officials said on Monday.

- By Kenneth Christiane L. Basilio

Manila’s fishery bureau is reviewing the state of its civilian patrol vessels and preparing guidelines to formalize the fleet’s operations, Presidential Assistant for Maritime Concerns Andres C.Centino said.

“Efforts are under way to complete a comprehensive inventory of Bantay Dagat (sea guards) units, where they will be issuing informed guidelines governing their creation, their adaptation and setting the standards of operations,” he told a security forum in Manila, referring to the civilian patrol fleet in Filipino.

The sea patrol is managed by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources and is composed of volunteer teams, mostly fishermen, tasked with a round-the-clock watch of the Philippines’ coastal waters.