Fisheries, Aquaculture and Marine Ecosystems

Papua New Guinea stakeholders express their interest in the DevFish2 project

pngtrip1Tuesday 12 April 2011 Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) headquarters, Noumea, New Caledonia – SPC’s Fisheries Development Officer was in Port Moresby, Lae and Rabaul from 29 January to 13 February, meeting potential stakeholders and beneficiaries of the EU-funded DevFish project to inform them about the commencement of DevFish2, the second phase of the project, highlighting the 5 focused intervention areas.

 

Discussions were held with the Papua New Guinea (PNG) Fishing Industry Association (FIA) about the need to develop a business plan corresponding to their priority work programme for the next two or three years. FIA also expressed an interest in seeking project assistance to fund a support officer to maintain an active secretariat’s office.

 

 

FIA executives will consult the wider membership of FIA on these matters and also on other issues affecting collective interests of the members and the industry in general at their annual general meeting The DevFish project will be informed of the common priorities to be incorporated into the business plan and how the DevFish project might support it.

 

SPC received updated information about the Pacific Marine Industrial Zone (PMIZ) project in Madang.

This is the PNG’s government’s move to make PNG the tuna hub of the region. PMIZ will create a Regional Tuna Processing Centre in Madang which will provide an opportunity for regional Pacific member countries and PNG’s own tuna industry to set up processing plants within the zone, providing an incentive to distant water fishing nations (DWFNs) to offload their catch, add value to their tuna catches and supply export markets.

 The 216 hectare site has been cleared and fenced off. Key infrastructure and facilities to be built in phase 1 (expected to commence in the first quarter of 2011) include an additional wharf, a water treatment plant, a waste treatment plant, roads and administration buildings. Special incentives under the proposed Special Economic Zone Legislation are still under discussion. The aim is to attract foreign and domestic tuna operators to invest in the zone. DevFish2 technical assistance may be required for specific components of this development.

 

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Pacific Marine Industrial Zone (PMIZ)-blue fenced area

 

 

At a meeting of the SPC Fisheries Development Officer and the Audit and Certification Unit of the National Fisheries Authority (NFA), competent authority training and skills upgrading for both NFA officers and the industry were highlighted as priority need areas. Other specific training and review needs related to independent audits of food business operators; awareness of illegal, unregistered and unreported (IUU) fishing; and awareness among exporting stakeholders of environmental contaminants.

 

Other beneficiaries of the DevFish2 project are the artisanal fishermen. In PNG, the NFA is enabling the participation of rural coastal communities in commercial fishing through fishermen cooperatives in the maritime provinces. The SPC Fisheries Development Officer met representatives of two such cooperatives, the Madang Fishermen Cooperative and the Kokopo Fisheries Association. Both benefit from this assistance, which addresses the prevailing problem of storage and transportation of rural communities’ fish catch to markets, the booming mining sector developments in particular providing a big market.

 The cooperatives expressed an interest in nearshore fish aggregating devices (FADs): materials, construction and maintenance training; fishing techniques around FAD; and community fisheries management awareness for cooperative members. DevFish2 will liaise with the NFA and the cooperatives to link support to the noted need areas.

 

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Inshore fishing vessel

 

 

For more information, please contact Jonathan Manieva, SPC’s Fisheries Development Officer.

Last Updated on Thursday, 19 May 2011 16:17
 

 


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