27 April, Praia/Rome - The Coastal Fisheries Initiative (CFI) has partnered with the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) to support small-scale fisheries in Cabo Verde on their journey towards sustainability.

Cabo Verde’s 1 020-kilometre coastline is home to 80 percent of its population, and many of its communities depend on coastal fisheries for their food and livelihoods. While the fishing grounds off the coasts of West Africa are some of the richest and most diverse in the world, they are increasingly threatened by overfishing and high levels of post-harvest losses as well as pollution and climate change.

In this West African country archipelago, the CFI works to improve fisheries governance, empower women in seafood value chains, deliver much-needed capacity building to local communities, and facilitate the sharing of best practices in sustainable fisheries management and post-harvest fish processing in an effort to preserve livelihoods, food security and marine biodiversity.

Providing the framework and tools for improved fishing practices in Cabo Verde

The MSC partnered with CFI in a technical advisory role to help local stakeholders understand the environmental performance of their fisheries. It focused on the blue-spotted seabass (Cephalopholis taeniops) hand-line fishery, which is of great socio-economic importance to Cabo Verde.

This fishery was benchmarked and pre-assessed against the MSC Fisheries Standard, which is one of the first models for sustainable fishing to base its requirements on the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries and which gives fisheries the opportunity to demonstrate their sustainability against internationally recognised best practice.

This comprehensive analysis of the fishery informs an initial improvement action plan, which will encourage more fishers to participate in the decision-making processes that ensure the sustainable use of the fishery.

“The CFI places local fishing communities at the heart of its work. We use the Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries (EAF) and a knowledge sharing strategy to empower women and men in fisheries value chains in order to achieve sustainability,” commented Ms Fatou Sock, FAO Fishery Officer and CFI Chief Technical Advisor.

”We cannot reach this goal without involving fishers and fish workers as well as scientists and authorities, because sustainability must embrace multiple dimensions — the social, the economic and the environmental. By addressing the needs of the communities and strengthening their voice, knowledge, skills and decision-making capacities, we can help ensure better livelihoods in healthier ecosystems,” she said.

“Collaborative projects like the CFI in Cabo Verde are fundamental to support countries, fishers, and regional stakeholders in their effort to improve the sustainability of their marine resources and activities. It also offers a great opportunity to use the MSC Fisheries Standard as a guide, or roadmap, towards improved environmental performance,” added Mr Carlos Montero Castaño, MSC Senior Fisheries Program Manager for West Africa.

”For these reasons, we value this project partnership with FAO and will continue to contribute to regional initiatives to ensure that all fisheries in West Africa, regardless of size, gear and location, can embark on their journey towards sustainability. Without a doubt, our collective efforts can help to ensure regional fisheries remain productive and resilient in the face of the growing pressures and demands placed on them,” he said.

About the CFI

The CFI is a collaborative, global programme funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF). It brings together fishing communities, governments, international conservation organizations, UN agencies and the World Bank to safeguard marine biodiversity and ensure more sustainable use and management of coastal fisheries in Asia (Indonesia), Latin America (Ecuador and Peru) and West Africa (Cabo Verde, Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal).

About the MSC

The MSC is an international non-profit organisation that works to protect oceans and safeguard seafood supplies for the future. Its mission is to use its ecolabel and fishery certification program to contribute to the health of the world’s oceans by recognising and rewarding sustainable fishing practices, influencing the choices people make when buying seafood and working with its partners to transform the seafood market to a sustainable basis.