Fourth Meeting of the SADC Task Force on IUU Fishing

Fourth Meeting of the SADC Task Force on IUU Fishing

May 2016 – Sandy Davies (Technical Director) was in Maputo from the 9th-11th May attending the 4th Meeting of the SADC Task Force on IUU Fishing.

The meeting was attended by government representatives from 12 SADC Member States and other countries in Eastern Southern Africa. Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Djibouti, DR Congo, France, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Also in attendance were officials from the African Union Inter-African Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR), European Union (EU), Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), Indian Ocean Commission (IOC), Lake Tanganyika Authority (LTA), East Africa Community/Lake Victoria Fisheries Organization (EAC/LVFO), Nile Basin Initiative/Nile Equatorial Lakes Subsidiary Action Program (NBI/NELSAP), Southern African Development Community (SADC), Stop Illegal Fishing (SIF), South Western Indian Ocean Fisheries Commission (SWIOFC), The World Bank, World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), and Zambezi Watercourse Commission (ZAMCOM), together with consultants and representative from the Interpol Regional Bureau of Harare.

The overall objective of the meeting was to develop a regional and sub-regional collaborative mechanism for effective management of shared fisheries resources in the EA-SA-IO region and to validate the draft Charter for the establishment of the Regional Fisheries Monitoring, Control and Surveillance Coordination Centre (MCSCC) in Southern Africa.

Sandy presented work of FISH-i Africa and the impacts that IUU fishing is having on the region as well as the results that the FISH-i Africa Task Force is achieving. 

members of the NFDS team were in London for the 9th International Forum on Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing at Chatham House.