OPP – Fisheries Business Case Development: Progress in the Bay of Bengal

The Bay of Bengal Programme Inter-Governmental Organisation (BOBP-IGO) is implementing the Bay of Bengal Ocean Partnership Project (OPP-BOB). The Project region comprises the Exclusive Economic Zones of Bangladesh, India, Maldives and Sri Lanka and the ABNJ waters encircling them. The region currently contributes 6% and 26% of the global and Indian Ocean tuna (including billfishes) landings. The countries differ considerably in respect of the composition of tuna fisheries value chain, institutional framework and development experience. However, the underlying and unifying common theme in this diversity is the importance of fisheries in coastal livelihoods and the weak institutions to optimize benefits at all levels. Given this, the OPP-BOB is primarily focused on initiating institutional reforms to open up possibilities for introduction of market and non-market instruments for ensuring sustainable and optimal flow of benefits. Beginning the process with broad-based regional consultations and knowledge mapping for sectoral characterization, six business cases are proposed that also aim at complimentary institutional reforms. These six cases include: (i) development of a ‘Regional Tuna Fisheries Consortium’ comprising governments and private stakeholders for a bottom-up participation in the global/IOTC tuna governance process; (ii) & (iii) development of management plans for coastal and migratory tunas in Gujarat and Lakshadweep respectively in India; (iv) improving fisheries MCS in the region; (v) improving catch quality through improved on-board preservation technology; and (vi) setting up of fisheries co-management system in Puducherry, India’. Simultaneously, capacity building activities at different levels and knowledge management is also being implemented to develop the Project synapse