KINGSTON, Jamaica, CMC -Jamaica will host the regional launch and meeting of the Caribbean Blue Justice Hub on Friday. It aims to address organized crime in the fisheries sector and Illegal Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing.
Agriculture, Fisheries, and Mining Minister Floyd Green will address the launch that will also be attended by his St. Vincent and the Grenadines counterpart, Saboto Caesar, the executive director of the Belize-based Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism (CRFM), Milton Haughton, as well as the Norwegian Ambassador to the Caribbean, Beate Stirø.
Supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in partnership with the government of Norway, ‘Blue Justice Hubs’ across the world focus on developing and sustaining capacity for practical inter-agency cooperation to address organized crime in the fisheries sector and Illegal, Unregulated, and Unreported Fishing, both in-country and with other countries regionally.
The regional launch comes one year after Jamaica, which had been named the regional hub for the Caribbean, launched its national Multi-Agency Fisheries Crime Coordinating Mechanism and announced that it was on track to become the ‘regional Blue Justice hub for the Caribbean,’ with the Jamaican National Fisheries Authority (NFA) as a focal point.
The Blue Justice Caribbean Hub is supported by the Norwegian government, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the CFRM.
Friday’s launch and meeting will also be attended by the chief executive officer of the Jamaica National Fisheries Authority, Dr. Gavin Bellamy, the UNDP Regional Technical Specialist for Water, Oceans, Ecosystems and Biodiversity, AnaMaria Nunez, as well as the UNDP Officer-In-Charge/Assistant Resident Representative, Ava Whyte and the project manager UNDP Blue Resilience, Emma Witbooi.
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