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Pacific Island Countries advance in the preparation of new UNDP-GEF Oceanic Fisheries Management Project

GEF-UNDP/FAO-FFA Pacific Oceanic Fisheries

By IW:LEARN

December 23^rd, 2020

In an online validation workshop on 26 November 2020, a new project supported by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) for Fisheries Agency Small Island States and endorsed by Pacific Island Fisheries Forum Agency (FFA) Members titled: ‘Mainstreaming climate change and ecosystem-based approaches into the sustainable management of the highly migratory fish stocks of the West and Central Pacific Ocean’ was endorsed. Fisheries representatives from fourteen Pacific small island developing states (SIDS), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), FFA, Pacific Community (SPC) and Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA) Office, along with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Pacific Island Tuna Industry Association, and the Island States expressed support to the project.

FFA Deputy Director General, Matt Hooper, who chaired the meeting, commended the consultants who put together the 380-page project document during a time when COVID made travel impossible.

This project will follow two other successful GEF, UNDP, Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and FFA projects focused on sustainable oceanic fisheries in the Pacific. The third Oceanic Fisheries Management Project (OFMP), that is nearing completion of its preparation phase, builds on the outcomes and achievements of the first two projects and will focus especially on identifying and managing the impacts of climate change and taking an ecosystem approach to managing the Pacific’s tuna fisheries through regional, sub-regional and national processes.

The giant green tower — tuna stock in the Western Pacific Ocean are all deemed to be harvested at sustainable levels — the task at hand is to keep it that way.

“An enormous amount of work has gone into this project documentation. It was heartening to see the member countries contributing along with our partners and industry.”

— Matt Hooper, FFA Deputy Director General

There is growing concern amongst Pacific nations in relation to the impacts of climate change on the distribution and abundance of tuna stocks which has been comprehensively studied by the ongoing OFMP II by the Pacific Communities Oceanic Fisheries Programme.

Climate Change could well impact the social and economic viability of SIDS differently across the region. A core concern is the effects of changes in ocean temperature and pH on tuna populations and associated food-chains, which would decrease access to this fishery for some countries. Taking an ecosystem-based approach to the threat of climate change, as well as other threats, will help ensure food security and economic well-being for the region.

The OFMP II, which is on an extension until June 2021, aims to support Pacific SIDS to meet their obligations to implement and enforce global, regional and subregional arrangements for the conservation and management of transboundary oceanic fisheries. Two outputs from this project were a Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis (TDA) and a subsequent Strategic Action Programme (SAP).

The TDA and the SAP were agreed to by the 14 SIDS involved in this Pacific oceanic tuna fishery, and the SAP was formally adopted by signature of the relevant Forum Fisheries Committee Ministers from each of the SIDS in mid-2019.

The outputs of the TDA and SAP, as laid out in the Project Identification Form (PIF), informed the background documentation that will be presented in the new Project Design Document (PDD), which sets out to address the root causes of the threats to the sustainability of Pacific fisheries as identified in the TDA, and to translate SAP strategies into a set of GEF project components.

The USAID `Climate Ready Program’ also came on board via UNDP to co-fund the PDD preparation.

Lead consultant David Vousden acknowledged the work of the country fisheries agencies in contributing to the document: “When reviewing the individual reports received from each of the countries on their various management obligations and constraints (in the areas of legal, policy, compliance, monitoring and science), it was particularly gratifying to note how closely these aligned with the conclusions and capacity needs identified previously from the TDA and SAP process.”

The national reports were prepared by Project Consultants Rhea Moss-Christain and Barbara Hanchard who were originally scheduled to visit the Member Countries for face to face meetings. However, the onset of COVID-19 in March rapidly closed the borders and a totally different process was set up to prepare these detailed reports via virtual processes.

Virtual processes have quickly become the new normal across the region and the SIDS Countries have demonstrated a significant commitment to the project preparation processes via virtual platforms commencing with the Project Inception Workshop in March, 2020 and continuing on an ongoing basis through the entire project preparation process.

The three main objectives of the new project are to:

Improve and strengthen management strategies and mechanisms for the ecosystem and its living marine resources;
Strengthen and expand scientific monitoring to support improved management and understanding of the ecosystem and its living marine resources;
Build capacity and train to improve management of the ecosystem and its living marine resources in the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) Area.

The 14 countries involved are: Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Republic of Marshal Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu.

OFMP II Project Coordinator, Hugh Walton, ended the project validation meeting by saying how much he enjoyed the process of putting the project documentation together: “I personally found the whole process informative and a useful handle on where we are up to and where we need to go. I am excited to be able to support our member countries on where we need to go. The GEF can see what we have done in this part of the world in oceanic fisheries is transformational – and this is an apt term to explain how our members have gone about the process.”

Upon completion, the full project documentation will be submitted to UNDP for review and clearance and onwards transmission to the GEF for review towards achieving GEF CEO endorsement. The Pacific Island Countries and partners look forward to project implementation in 2021.

About the OFMP II

The Oceanic Fisheries Management Project (OFMP II) is designed to achieve systematic, sustained changes in fishing patterns and on-the-water behaviour at regional, sub-regional and national levels. Achieving these changes will result in the conservation and sustainable use of the Western and Central Pacific Oceanic fisheries.

For more information on this project, please contact the Project Coordinator, Hugh Walton (hugh.walton@ffa.int). Additionally, please access the project website and the dedicated project page on iwlearn.net.

Footnotes

Cover photo: Purse seining dominates tuna fishing efforts in the Pacific (Photo credit: Malo Hosken, Pacific Community). Written by: Jenni Metcalfe and Hugh Walton

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FootNotes

Cover photo: Purse seining dominates tuna fishing efforts in the Pacific (Photo credit: Malo Hosken, Pacific Community). Written by: Jenni Metcalfe and Hugh Walton