This is a comment made on behalf of Sea PoWer, an international NGO registered in the United Republic of Tanzania, who works with and support women seaweed farmers in Zanzibar and mainland Tanzania (www.seapower.or.tz)
There is an important gap in the SSF Guidelines and their implementation in that they do not explicitly include small-scale (women) seaweed producers.
Technically, seaweed farming falls out of the scope of the SSF Guidelines. However, in East Africa, seaweed is farmed by producers who meet all the characteristics of "small-scale" producers described in the Guidelines. As a result, these producers and the constraints they face are not taken into account in policies or plans of action. This is despite the economic importance of their activity (seaweed is Zanzibar's second export), the similarity of the challenges they faced with those faced by small-scale fishers, and the strong relevance of the articles of the guidelines to those small-scale women seaweed producers.
Because the SSF Guidelines are more about people than what they fish, I would like to recommend that, in some particular circumstances, the scope of the implementation of SSF Guidelines be extended to encompass local specificities or cases of this nature.
Thank you.
Cecile Brugere, Chairperson of Sea PoWer
Dr. Cecile Brugere