Panel discussion to dissect fishing issues

Headline:Panel discussion to dissect fishing issues

UWI NOTEBOOK

THE uncertainties surrounding the future of sustainable commercial fishing in the Caribbean region will be explored next Monday when the Centre for Resource Management and Environmental Studies hosts the panel discussion: Caribbean Fisheries: Sinking or Swimming in Uncertain Waters.

The public discussion will take place at 7 p.m. at the Fisheries Division Complex on Princess Alice Highway, Bridgetown and it draws on expert insight from Minister of Agriculture, Senator Haynesley Benn, who has been invited to officially open the proceedings; Milton Haughton, deputy executive director of the Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism Secretariat in Belize; Mitchell Lay, an Antiguan fisherman who is head of the coordinating unit for the Regional Fisherfolk Network; Barbados' Ambassador to the Caribbean Community, Dennis Kellman; and UWI Cermes Senior Lecturer and marine researcher, Dr Patrick McConney.

Some of the issues which will be tackled include whether there is the shared political will to finalise the Common Fisheries Policy and Regime, whether fishers have enough say in regional fisheries management, whether regional politicians take the fisheries sector seriously, and whether there can be large scale collaboration between regional fishers.

This panel discussion falls within the work programme of CERMES' four-year applied research project on marine resource governance in the Eastern Caribbean (the MarGov project), which aims to translate findings into beneficial change for marine resource governance, policy and management. In keeping with the regional scope of the project, the discussion will be recorded for radio and television broadcast across the Eastern Caribbean.