Key issues on the agenda at the second meeting of the MCSCC Board of Directors
Johannesburg, South Africa – March 04-06, 2025
The MCSCC Board of Directors held its second meeting in South Africa on 4-6 March 2025, with key issues on the agenda for advancing the operationalisation of the Fisheries Monitoring Control and Surveillance Coordination Centre (MCSCC). After two days of technical deliberations amongst the Board Members with support of the MCSCC technical team and MCSCC partners, the Board endorsed important instruments related to the governance and the financial structure of the MCSCC, as well as the Code for the establishment and implementation of the Regional Register of Fishing Vessel through the MCSCC (RRFV Code) aimed at setting the framework for the establishment and implementation of the SADC Regional Register of Fishing Vessels (RRFV). The next step: the Joint Meeting of SADC Ministers of Agriculture and Food Security, Fisheries and Aquaculture in May, where those instruments will be submitted for approval.
For over two decades, SADC Ministers responsible for Fisheries have made repeated commitments to combatting illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, it was by recalling these commitments that the Chair of the Board of Directors, Stanley Ndara, opened the second meeting of the Board of Directors. The MCSCC was established to combat this “scourge”, he said, emphasising the “role that the Board of Directors has to play in guiding the process of operationalising the MCSCC to achieve its mandate in combatting IUU fishing and related fisheries crimes in the region”.
The meeting was attended by nine members of the Board representing the following State Parties: Angola, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, and Zambia. The meeting was supported by SADC Secretariat, the Interim Programme Management Unit (IPMU) of the MCSCC, Members of the Regional technical Team (RTT) from Malawi, Mozambique, and Seychelles, as well as partners that included African Union Inter-African Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR), German Development Cooperation Agency (GIZ), Stop Illegal Fishing (SIF), TRAFFIC, Trygg Matt Tracking (TMT), and World-Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).
For this meeting, the Board Members had set themselves an ambitious agenda, with the goal to finalise and validate key instruments related to the governance and the financial structure of the MCSCC. These included the annual work plan and budget of the MCSCC, the MCSCC Governance Manual and the MCSCC Secretariat’s Organisational Chart, which were endorsed by the Board of Directors. The meeting was also used by the MCSCC RTT to make recommendations to the Board of Directors with regards to the operations of the MCSCC, and to present its special report focussed on the RRFV Code.
Initial steps towards the establishment of the RRFV had already been started through the MCSCC Operational Task Force, which made initial recommendations on initial criteria and conditions as part of a phased approach for the establishment of the Register. Those regional consultations through the MCSCC Operational Task Force, as well as national sensitisation with decision-makers and stakeholders in the countries, paved the way to the elaboration of the RRFV Code that was presented and endorsed by the Board of Directors at the meeting. The RRFV Code supports the vision of the SADC Charter Establishing MCSCC to use the RRFV as a key tool to operationalise SADC commitments against IUU fishing and to provide a tangible mechanism for the financial sustainability of the MCSCC, with the opportunity to generate funds through registration onto the RRFV. Ensuring the sustainability of the MCSCC is a critical issue, which will be addressed as part of a sustainability plan to be elaborated through the MCSCC Secretariat and its partners. Prioritising reflections on sustainability is essential in the long term, ensuring that the Centre benefits from secured and permanent core funding for its activities.
The MCSCC is showing leadership for the whole continent, and the MCSCC’s technical partners will continue supporting the MCSCC in enhancing visibility and communication around MCSCC activities.
The MCSCC Board of Directors thanked the SADC Secretariat, the MCSCC IPMU, the Government of Mozambique, Member States, and partners for contributing towards successful hosting of the second meeting of the Board. They acknowledged the generous support from AU-IBAR, SADC Secretariat, SIF, and WWF towards the hosting the meeting. The MCSCC can count on the support of its partners to accompany those processes, who reiterated their support to the MCSCC – together to protect our fisheries.
Final communiqué of the 2nd meeting of the Board of Directors (BOD) of the MCSCC : English, French and Portuguese.
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