The Government of the Russian Federation has approved the Decree “On Conducting a Trial Operation Experiment for Autonomous Ships under the Russian Federation State Flag”.

The overall aim of the project is to create legal and technical conditions for the massive use of autonomous ships.  According to the head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade of Russia, three sets of tasks are being solved within the project framework:  the development of a legal framework, the creation of a standard set of technical systems that allow any existing ship to be upgraded to an autonomous one, and the development of these technical means on various ships in the real conditions of their regular commercial operation.