Pursuant to Resolution II of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea and the Statement on the Implementation of Resolution II of the Preparatory Commission of 5 September 1986 and the Statement of Understanding on the Implementation of Resolution II of 10 April 1987, India has been registered as a Pioneer Investor and an area of 150,000 sq. km. allocated to it in the central Indian Ocean basin with exclusive rights to carry out pioneer activities in the area. An action plan has accordingly been designed to implement the deep sea bed polymetallic nodules programme with the objective of attaining a strategic technological capability in this field. This long term multi-disciplinary programme covers three distinct aspects, viz. (i) exploration, (ii) extraction of metals from nodules, and (iii) design and development of a test deep seabed mining system. Initially a low volume deep seabed mining system and metal extraction plants will be installed.