Communiqué - Expert Meeting for Short-Listing of Institutions for Selection as Africa Centres of Excellence in Fisheries and Aquaculture in Africa
© 2018 AU-IBAR. Experts at the Meeting for short-listing of institutions for selection as Africa Centres of excellence in fisheries and aquaculture.The Expert Meeting on short-listing for selection of institutions as Africa Centres of Excellence (CoE), following the second call for proposals that was launched between 7th June and 6th July 2018, was organized by the African Union Inter-African Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) on the 8-9th August 2018 in Nairobi, Kenya.
The meeting was opened by the Director of AU-IBAR, Professor Ahmed El-Sawalhy. The Director welcomed the experts to AU-IBAR and expressed appreciation for their endeavour to travel and provide technical guidance on the selection process. He recalled the attention of the experts to the decisions of the 2014 Summit of African Heads of States and Governments that requested African Union to establish Africa Centres of Excellence in fisheries and aquaculture. The Director of AU-IBAR admonished the experts that it is therefore crucially important that the selection process is conducted in a professional and credible manner.
The Retired Director of AU-IBAR, Dr. Modibo Traore, chaired the Expert Meeting. In opening remarks, he expressed appreciation to AU-IBAR for the implementation of the recommendations from the Expert Meeting in May 2018 after conclusion of the verifications of short-listed institutions in the first call of expression of interest. He reiterated the critical nature of the process and the potential to promote sustainable fisheries management and responsible aquaculture in Africa. The process, when successfully completed, would address one of the longstanding challenges to evidence based sector governance – the need to strengthen human resources and institutional capacity.