6. The Chairperson welcomed the old and new members of the Committee, and expressed his appreciation to the Fisheries Department for providing excellent facilities and documents for this Session. He expressed the hope that the Committee would make positive contribution to the work of the Fisheries Department and recalled the importance of the Advisory Committee on Fisheries Research which is a statutory body to FAO to advise the Director-General on research-related issues of capture fisheries and aquaculture. Mr Sissenwine indicated that the Committee was expected to set an agenda for its work and observed that, in addition, the Committee was expected to provide advice to the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of Unesco on the fisheries aspects of oceanography. The Chairperson further indicated that the Committee had agreed to meet during the last quarter of the first year of the FAO biennium in order to contribute to the formulation of the work programme of the Fisheries Department and to ensure its advice could be submitted to the Committee on Fisheries (COFI) for consideration, as appropriate.
7. The Chairperson informed the Committee that, as in the past, it would work on a flexible timetable. He envisaged that, among other things, the Committee would, on its first day undertake a retrospection of its achievements. The second day would be devoted to forward-looking as the Committee would consider ways to operationalize the outcomes of the World Summit on Sustainable Development 2002 (WSSD) for positive impact on the Fisheries Sector. On the third day, the Committee would identify priority issues and, if possible, elaborate research agenda briefs on a few of them. Members of the Committee would have the opportunity to interact further with staff of the Fisheries Department on the morning of the fourth day. In addition, Mr Sissenwine expressed the wish for the Committee to identify, as it had done at its First Session, a mega priority cross-cutting issue which could be followed through the term of the current members of the Committee.
