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1.1.2 Fisheries Co-management Activity Lead:
Kofi Agbogah
Activity Team: CRC CoP, Communications Officer, MOFADFC. FoN, Attorney
General’s OfficeParliamentary committee responsible for fisheries The SFMP will work closely with MOFAD and the attorney general’s office on procedural
processes and strategies for developing legislative amendments to the fisheries act. While the WARFP work on legislative reform is broad based and places some emphasis on co-
management, SFMP will augment those efforts. Our strategy will focus on bringing
stakeholders’ participation and input into the process via various national meetings and workshops. Hen Mpoano will facilitate and coordinate the national level work needed for the
legislative reform process with MOFAD, FC and WARFP and the Legislative Drafting Division and the Parliament select committee on Food, Agriculture and Cocoa Affairs including natural
resources and fisheries and the Parliamentary sub-committee on subsidiary legislation. Legislative changes such as on co-management will need to be bundled with a host of other
WARFP supported revisions underway. The timeframe for submitting an amendment to the Fisheries Act to Parliament is in 2018.
In Year 2, SFMP will begin a processes of bringing stakeholders up to speed on what fisheries co-management is and how it could be implemented in Ghana as well as what institutional
structures are necessary to ensure successful fisheries co-management as well as and prepare recommendations on how fisheries co-management can be structured in law as part of the legal
reforms planned by MOFAD.
We will run a public engagement process also see Communications section IR3 to insure fishers and the public are well informed and can voice their opinions and have inputs and say
into the way co-management can best be implemented in Ghana, taking into consideration lessons learned from past efforts. Important in this process is the participation of women’s
groups as women play key roles in fish processing and marketing and many are also vessel owners. Legislative reforms on co-management must also acknowledge the role of women in
fisheries and therefore formalize and ensure their role in co-management processes as well.
Another critical aspect of legal reform is incorporation of sustainable financing mechanisms for co-management. This was highlighted as a critical challenge that led to the failure of the first
round of community-based management committees more than a decade ago.
1.1.3 Policy analysis on potential alternative benefits for fishers compared to the fuel subsidy Activity Lead:
Jim Tobey
Activity Team: URI CRC, CRC Accra, SSG, MOFADFC
In Year 2, The SFMP will undertake policy analysis work focused on potential options that could be provided as benefits for fisherfolk in comparison to the pre-mix fuel subsidy. The regional
dialogues have demonstrated that there is growing support among stakeholders that this program should be eliminated but only if the fishing community received benefits in other ways. The
GoG has also committed to the eventual phasing out and the level of price subsidy has already been somewhat reduced. This policy analysis will look at options such as cash transfer payments
directly to fish workers linked to certain conditions such as attendance at school of children to reduce potential for child labor and trafficking, or evidence of a visit to a primary care clinic
10 annually, or immunizations of children, compliance with closed seasons and not arrests for
illegal fishing, etc. Other options to be examined will include linkages to the private sector partnerships related to insurance e.g. accident, health, and vessel and pension schemes for
fishermen. Most of these programs will require some form of registry of fishermen and fish workers and therefore some form of individual registration scheme and linkages to the vessel
registry system.
The analysis will include a top-level systems model to facilitate the comparison of options, impacts and implementation of risks. In addition, SFMP will complete the bio-economic analysis
of the fisheries if the fuel subsidy is removed that was started under WARFP but remains incomplete; and impact it would have on stocks and fishing effort.
1.2 Strengthened Law Enforcement