The Fisheries Committee for the West Central Gulf of Guinea (FCWC) participated in the Fourth Steering Group Meeting of the “Supporting effective implementation of the Port State Measures Agreement (PSMA) in Africa: Intelligence-led Fisheries Port Controls” programme, which was hosted by the Government of Madagascar from 5 to 6 December 2024 in Antananarivo. The meeting was jointly organised by Global Fishing Watch (GFW) and TMT.
The two-day event was hosted under the auspices of the Madagascar Ministry of Fisheries and Blue Economy (MPEB) and attended by representatives from Regional Fisheries Bodies (FCWC, Southern African Development Cooperation (SADC), Subregional Fisheries (SFRC), Indian Ocean Commission (IOC), national fisheries and port authorities (Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, Guinea, Kenya, Madagascar, Nigeria, Senegal, Togo), and a technical team made up of GFW and TMT.
TMT, in partnership with GFW, has been delivering technical assistance to African States in the form of analysis, tools, and capacity training aimed at supporting national efforts for implementing the PSMA, with a particular focus on the Advanced Request for Entry to Port (AREP) process and risk analysis. The programme began with four pilot countries (Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, and Senegal), and has now expanded to Benin, Liberia, Nigeria, Togo, Madagascar and Guinea, where all countries receive technical and operational support for implementing PSMA in their countries.
This fourth Steering Group meeting was convened to meet several objectives. It provided an opportunity to conclude the country onboarding processes and update focal points on the programme and planned activities. The results of a baseline study related to PSMA implementation in the six newly onboarded countries were shared, and discussions were held about its key outcomes.
The meeting identified a lack of knowledge on port exposure to IUU risks, inadequate legal frameworks and AREP procedures, limited access to vessel information, limited inter-agency cooperation and insufficient inspector training as areas that require technical support to improve, which this programme hopes to contribute to, together with other capacity building initiatives benefitting the FCWC region.
A second generation of PSMA Port Profiles – an analysis report designed to provide an overview and key statistics of port usage by foreign fishing (and related) vessels – was presented to participants, highlighting its utility during preliminary risk analysis. In the pilot phase, PSMA Port Profiles were developed for the ports of Abidjan, Dakar, Mombasa, and Tema ports. The new series of Port Profiles is now being prepared, with the Port Profile of Conakry (Guinea) being the first to be delivered in 2025. An updated version of Vessel Viewer, an innovative tool jointly developed by TMT and GFW, was also presented, including its recent integration into the Global Fishing Watch platform and new functionalities useful for risk assessment purposes.
The meeting also contributed to building the case for an inter-regional mechanism, using recent cases and investigations into IUU incidents to highlight the benefit of cross-regional information sharing as part of PSMA implementation. Regional MCS centres in the FCWC, SRFC and SADC regions represented in the meeting expressed their interest for the establishment of such a mechanism based on regional focal points and the use of existing tools such as their respective communication platforms as well as the FAO Global Information Exchange System (GIES) currently being rolled out in several African countries.
“Recent investigations by port States in the FCWC region have demonstrated the importance of region-to-region information sharing, and this will become an increasing focus area of this programme going forward”, said TMT’s programme lead Yann Yvergniaux. “With current programme countries active through the FCWC RMCSC and the SADC MCSCC, the SRFC and soon COREP with the upcoming onboarding of Gabon, we have communication relays which we can empower to work together on PSMA implementation, using the tools at their disposal”.
With all six Member States now covered by this programme, the FCWC remains a key partner in this initiative focused on PSMA implementation. In the current phase, the role of the RMCSC in responding to support requests from Member States and relaying those requests to other coastal, flag and port States will continue to be reinforced.
