The African Advisory Group (AAG) is planning to assess the implementation of the Small-scale Fisheries Guidelines (SSFG) in 10 African countries this year.

In February 2020, Masifundise coordinated a workshop in Zimbabwe to unite delegates from regional organisations to plan priorities for the implementation of the SSF Guidelines. This gathering put forth an objective to guarantee that a coherent set of polices, strategies and actions are taken.

From this meeting, it was decided that an African Advisory Group (AAG) is to support implementation of the SSF Guidelines, and nominated Masifundise to provisionally host the group’s Secretariat in South Africa.

The assessments that will take place are part of the core work of the group. The fieldwork methodology allows for surveys and interviews to be conducted at community level. In turn, this will assess whether the SSF guidelines have made an impact on small-scale fishing communities on the ground.

These assessments are important to gauge where each African country stands and will inform the priorities to which we will decide on for advocacy work in the coming years.

“Usually, national governments report back to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) that they’ve ratified the SSF guidelines and put it into policy. However, that does not necessarily mean that it has been implemented on the ground. The work that the AAG will be doing to assess this implementation is important because, this will determine whether the SSF guidelines are actually a reality and meaningful to the people they were meant to reach” Mishumo Madima, Project Officer (Global Movement Building) at Masifundise.

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