By Dr. Sloans Chimatiro, Senior Fisheries Advisor, NEPAD Agency

31^st January 2011, Rome - The 29^th Session of the Food and Agriculture Organisation’s (FAO) Committee on Fisheries (COFI) is being held at the FAO Headquarters in Rome, Italy form 31^st January to 4^th February 2011.

COFI is a subsidiary body of the FAO Council, which was established by the FAO Conference at its Thirteenth Session in 1965. The Committee presently constitutes the only global inter-governmental forum where major international fisheries and aquaculture problems and issues are examined and recommendations addressed to governments, regional fishery bodies, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), fish workers, FAO and the international community, periodically on a world-wide basis. COFI has also been used as a forum in which global agreements and non-binding instruments are negotiated.

The two main functions of COFI are to review the programmes of work of FAO in the field of fisheries and aquaculture and their implementation, and to conduct periodic general reviews of fishery and aquaculture problems of an international character and appraise such problems and their possible solutions with a view to concerted action by nations, by FAO, inter-governmental bodies and the civil society.

As part of the process to guide African member states at the COFI, the NEPAD Planning and Coordinating Agency has undertaken to:

• Develop briefing notes (in French, Portuguese & English) based on the agenda topics, and isolated issues which are critical for African fisheries and aquaculture;
• Hold daily morning briefings with the African delegates to agree on common areas of interest in order to raise the “African Voice” during the meeting; and
• To hold a side event on the 3^rd of February, under the theme of “Developing Strategic Cooperation to Strength the Role of African Fisheries”.

The morning briefing meetings have been organised with the help of the Head of African Permanent Representatives to FAO, Ambassador Wilfred Ngirwa, the Permanent Representative of the United Republic of Tanzania to FAO.  

In his opening remarks, on the first day, 31^st January 2011, Ambassador Ngirwa commended the NEPAD Agency for deciding to arrange the meetings, which he noted as being critical in guiding the African delegates at the COFI. He further noted that COFI was the last in the series of FAO Committees and that the active deliberation of the African member states was important in order for FAO’s fisheries and aquaculture programme to reflect the needs of the African continent.

The NEPAD Agency’s Senior Fisheries Advisor, Dr. Sloans Chimatiro reported that the COFI briefing notes had been prepared by NPCA in order to assist African delegates to improve their understanding of the COFI agenda as well as provide guide to critical areas for consideration either individually as sovereign states or collectively as Africans who share fisheries resources. 

Chimatiro further pointed out that the briefing paper was not intended to provide positions or to cover all aspects or options available; it was rather a starting point for discussion and to assist the African delegations to discuss agenda items together. He went on to add that the briefing paper had largely been derived from the decisions of the Conference of African Ministers of Fisheries and Aquaculture (CAMFA) which was held in Banjul, The Gambia from 21^st to 23^rd September 2010.

The first day of briefing, 31^st January 2011 was attended by over 20 delegates, including 2 African ministers of fisheries.  

Keep checking on the NEPAD site for more updates.