Improving fish trade between African countries was on the agenda during a recent Think Tank Meeting in Nigeria.

“The overall objective of this meeting was to present the research and development findings and outputs by studies under the Fisheries Governance and Fish Trade Projects and to identify policy entry points that will enhance intra-regional trade of fish and fish products for improved and significant contributions to the Malabo goals of tripling regional trade by 2025”, a press release on the website of the African Union International Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) stated.

African fish trade struggle

In a recent news article on the launch of a pan-African project to strengthen fish trade on SciDev.net, experts said although Africa has abundant resources for fish farming, consumption is below the world average due to low investment.

“Trade is constrained by an inadequate market and trade infrastructure and poor policy implementation, complex and unaligned trade rules and poor market information,” Felix Koskei, Kenya’s cabinet secretary for agriculture, said during the launch.

 Workshop conclusions

The Think Tank was organised by AU-IBAR in collaboration with the NEPAD Planning and Coordinated Agency (NPCA) and WorldFish and was supported by the European Union. It  was attended by specialists in fisheries and trade, representatives from sectors in the supply chain and regulatory bodies from 19 African countries.

Noteworthy recommendations and conclusions from the sessions include the alignment of regional and national policies and trade regulations, combining regional trade reports and information, establishing Fish Trade portals, strengthening existing ones and creating more awareness of it, identifying existing trade routes and formalising informal trade.

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