Naval personnel are trained to carry out NCAGS establish and provide advice for safe passage of merchant ships worldwide, during times of peace, tension, crisis and war.
It conducts multinational exercises to strengthen ties between national navies and the civilian shipping industry.
[2] NCAGS can sometimes be confused with Allied Worldwide Navigational Information System (AWNIS),[3] which is a completely different set of skills in this area.
After 2001, the UK Royal Navy created a Naval Reserve–manned UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) office in Dubai to coordinate and exchange information with merchant traffic in the Arabian Sea to help counter Somali piracy.
The Maritime Trade Information Centre (MTIC) in Portsmouth, UK, supports UKMTO outputs.