A High-Level stakeholders’ meeting for the establishment of a Fisheries Law Enforcement Academy, was held, this morning at Le Meridien in Pointe aux Piments. The initiative is a joint collaboration of the Open University of Mauritius and the Nelson Mandela University (NMU) of South Africa.
On the occasion, a Memorandum of Understanding between the Open University of Mauritius and the NMU of South Africa, was signed in presence of the Director General, Dr Kaviraj Sharma Sukon. This collaboration represents an important milestone that shall reinforce Academia-Industry partnership and help develop long term collaboration, beneficial for our country.
The NMU has established the Fisheries Crime Law Enforcement Academy (FishFORCE) to build law enforcement expertise, reinforce cooperation between agencies, domestically and across the border and enhance law enforcement to fight against fisheries crime.
The aim of the meeting was to share and draw on participant countries’ experience in law enforcement in fisheries, and to confirm interest in and firm commitment to rolling out the FishFORCE Academy’s training in Mauritius. To this end, the FishFORCE Academy project will be formally presented to participants, together with the fisheries crime law enforcement model that underpins the project.
The meeting was attended by the political and executive level of key ministries and agencies within Mauritius. During the meeting, Mauritius was requested to commit to the implementation of the FishFORCE Academy within their jurisdiction and to appoint mid-level directors and experts of key agencies and institutions to High Level Reference Groups to be established for each of the respective Country Chapters.
FishFORCE project
The FishFORCE pilot project, will be rolled out and adapted to all interested partner-countries and such chapters were established in Kenya in 2018, Tanzania in 2019 and Mozambique in 2020.
The intention is that after the meeting, Mauritius will form a Country Chapter to ensure that a training programme is organically developed in Mauritius and that same address the need in the country. The Country specific Chapter will with assistance of NMU’s FishFORCE Academy develop curriculum, harness existing local expertise to this end, to ensure that the Academy is technically relevant in the particular partner country.
