Moves are being made towards the establishment of a new Regional Fisheries Management Organisation for the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, an area that is lacking an RFMO to co-ordinate fisheries research and management in spite of the importance of the region’s biodiversity and the values that fisheries add to the economies of the region’s coastal nations.
PERSGA,the Regional Organisation for the Conservation of the Environment of the Red Sea & Gulf of Aden, of which Djibouti, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen are member nations has been active in the region for some years and its remit is primarily the protection of coastal and marine environments.
The process towards an RFMO for the region has not been a rapid one to date. The call went out at the 28th session of the FAO Committee on Fisheries in 2009 and was reiterated and endorsed the following year at the FAO regional conference for the Near East and North Africa.
The FAO has supported the Arab and African nations in establishing an RFMO for the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and a co-ordination group made up of representatives from countries in the area, including PERSGA members Egypt, Sudan and Saudi Arabia, are set to discuss the FAO’s proposed final draft on the Red Sea/Gulf of Aden RFMO.
