In an intervention on Agenda Item 5 at the ongoing 33rd session meeting of the Committee on Fisheries (COFI) of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Collective in Support of Fishworkers (ICSF) has requested the Committee to advise the FAO Secretariat to broaden the questionnaire targeted at regional fisheries bodies and non-governmental organizations/civil society organizations (NGOs/CSOs) on the implementation of the Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries (CCRF) and also to report on their activities toward the implementation of the SSF Guidelines.
The 33rd session of COFI, being held in Rome during 9-13 July 2018, aims to review the status of the world’s fisheries and aquaculture and establish global agreements for effective fisheries management.
While expressing its appreciation to the FAO Secretariat for including a section on small-scale fisheries under the questionnaire for reporting the progress of the implementation of the Code, thus continuing a practice first introduced in the 32nd Session of COFI, ICSF points to the lack of information on what the regional fisheries bodies and NGOs/CSOs have undertaken toward the implementation of the SSF Guidelines.
Noting that there are three different CCRF questionnaires — one addressed to the Member States, one to regional fisheries bodies, and one to the CSOs and NGOs — ICSF hoped for a more comprehensive questionnaire to capture all efforts towards embracing responsible fisheries when we observe the 25th anniversary of the Code in 2020.
2018 ICSF