Session 5 Ministerial Mechanism

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Session 5 Ministerial Mechanism

• Prepared by
• Gilles Hosch
• Adviser to the ACP Secretariat

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87th Council Resolution

• 9. Calls for a first Meeting of the ACP Ministers
  responsible for fisheries to be convened not
  later than in the first quarter of the year 2009,
  with a view, inter alia, to establishing a
  ministerial mechanism for ACP coordination and
  cooperation on fisheries issues
• 10. Mandates the Committee of Ambassadors of the
  ACP Group in Brussels to establish a Working
  Group, which shall be charged with the
  responsibility to prepare for the first meeting
  of ACP Ministers responsible for fisheries and to
  prepare the ground for the establishment of the
  ministerial fisheries coordination and
  cooperation mechanism

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3 step process

• Step 1 1st meeting of ACP Ministers in charge
  of Fisheries, June 2009, Brussels. Proposal for a
  ministerial mechanism submitted to the senior
  officials for debate. Adopted by Ministers.
• Step 2 Period leading up to the Council of
  Ministers Meeting, November 2009. Finalization of
  the wording of objectives, functions and formal
  rules of procedure.

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3 step process

• Step 3 Meeting of the ACP Council of Ministers,
  November 2009. The ACP Council of Ministers shall
  endorse the Rules of Procedure for the
  Ministerial mechanism. The ACP Council shall then
  propose a date for the first meeting.

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Objective of the mechanism

• based on two considerations a) the current
  crisis in world fisheries has got to be addressed
  by the mechanism, and b) the existence and works
  of the mechanism will have to provide clear
  benefits to ACP members. It needs to achieve
  things that individual countries would not be
  able to achieve.

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Objective of the mechanism

• The overall objective of the Ministerial
  Fisheries Mechanism is to shore up political
  support, both within the group and from its
  external partners, for new approaches to
  fisheries governance, in order to ensure that
  fisheries play their just part in the social and
  economic development of ACP member States.

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Functions of the mechanism

• Monitor and evaluate major fisheries development,
  trade and cooperation activities with ACP
  partners, including the EU, and where necessary
  and appropriate, formulate recommendations for
  change.
• Ensure recommendations of the Fisheries Mechanism
  are duly taken into account, inter alia, when
  major ACP-EU programs, projects and/or texts are
  being reviewed.
• Promote the gathering and sharing of summarized
  strategic information between ACP countries at
  the highest political level.
• Directly promote commonly shared objectives and
  aspirations of ACP States within fisheries with
  external players and partners allowing the ACP
  to assume a pro-active stand in all relevant
  fora.
• Provide, where needed and appropriate, strategic
  advice to member States in their negotiations on
  fisheries issues.

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Name of the Mechanism

• It is proposed that the mechanism on fisheries be
  called the ACP Fisheries Ministerial Mechanism
  (or the Fisheries Mechanism)

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Rules of procedure

• Structure auxiliary bodies
• Meetings
• Members of the Regular Ministerial Meeting
• Duties of the Chair
• Fund

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Follow-up of the WGF/ACP Secr.

• Submit all relevant proposals relating to
  objectives and functions of the Fisheries
  Mechanism, financing of its Regular and
  Extraordinary Meetings, and relating to the
  creation of a fund, to the review panel in charge
  of the CPA review for their endorsement and
  inclusion
• Develop alternative proposals that would
  effectively replace failed proposals with
  alternative workable solutions

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Thank you for your attention
Resolution Articles 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7