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‘TZ fully committed to fisheries development’

TANZANIA has assured fellow Member States of the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) that it is fully committed to implement the action plan on the water and fisheries development.

TANZANIA: TANZANIA has assured fellow Member States of the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) that it is fully committed to implement the action plan on the water and fisheries development.

Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries, Prof Riziki Shemdoe made the assurance on Thursday after signing the host country agreement with the OACPS secretariat for Tanzania to host the forthcoming 8th meeting of the organisation.

The agreement contains a number of things that Tanzania would do during this preparatory stage ahead of the meeting as well as during the meeting.

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The meeting, to be held from 9th to 13th September this year, will bring together ministers in charge of fisheries and livestock from 79 OACPS Member States.

“I want to assure you that Tanzania is fully committed. We have done a lot and we will still do more. We are going to have a list of things that we have been doing for the past two years since we started chairing the fishing and blue economy sector of the OACPS,” Prof Mdoe stated.

The Permanent Secretary called upon stakeholders to participate in the event so that the country successfully conducts such an iconic event.

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“I assure you that we are ready and we hope to have an iconic event that will be remembered,” Prof Mdoe said, adding that getting the opportunity to host such a key meeting was the result of President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s move to immediately endorse the proposal by the ministry.

The 7th Meeting of the OACPS Ministers in charge of Fisheries and Aquaculture took place on April 7–8, 2022 in Accra, Ghana. The meeting brought together policymakers to discuss the future of sustainable fisheries and aquaculture development.

Tanzania’s Ambassador to Belgium and OACPS, Jestas Nyamanga, thanked the Secretary General and the organising team for the support to Tanzania since it assumed chairmanship of the OACPS.

“I send gratitude to the President for giving consent to this process, for Tanzania to be the chair, we had to do a number of consultations, we also thank the President for giving the approval,” Ambassador Nyamanga stressed.

Commenting, Deputy Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock, Dr Edwin Mhede, who is chairman of the coordinating committee of the forthcoming OACPS meeting, said the meeting will focus on areas which require more attention and take stock of issues so that all Member States could sail in one page.

On her part, OACPS’s Assistant Secretary General for Environment and Climate Action, Ms Cristelle Pratt, remarked that among the objectives of the organisation is to reduce poverty. She said Tanzania has many things to share during the next meeting considering its vast ocean coastline, lakes and rivers.