EAF Implementation in the South West Indian Ocean area. A baseline report

EAF Implementation in the South West Indian Ocean area. A baseline report

Descripción

In Africa, a number of Ecological Risk Assessment (ERA) workshops have been organized in relation to the application of the ecosystem approach to fisheries (EAF). The ERA is as a structured, transparent process to develop a shared vision amongst stakeholders and to clarify what is required to implement an EAF in a particular fishery. The outputs of these workshops have allowed for the development of a tool to track EAF implementation. A workshop was held in Pretoria, South Africa from 20 to 24 F ebruary 2011 to examine where countries in the South West Indian Ocean Fisheries Commission (SWIOFC) area stand in the adoption and implementation of EAF. The tracking tool was used as a means of establishing a baseline for EAF implementation in each of the SWIOFC countries, and in the region as a whole, by working on selected fisheries that are important both nationally and regionally. In general, the results of the workshop showed that countries have recorded several achievements towards honou ring the World Summit on Sustainable Development commitment on adoption and implementation of the ecosystem approach to fisheries. This notwithstanding, many of the countries are not aware of this effort and are either sceptical about EAF implementation or believe that they do not have the capacity to implement EAF. Overall, the process has provided a good first step in developing a tracking method for EAF implementation in the SWIOFC region and stimulating discussions on the use of an ecosystem approach in the management of fisheries in the region.