By: Sarah Baafi
The Government of Ghana has launched a three-year national project aimed at strengthening compliance with the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies, in a move designed to protect marine resources and promote sustainable fisheries governance.
The initiative was unveiled at a high-level meeting in Accra convened by the Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture, with participation from the Fisheries Commission. The project is funded by the WTO Fish Fund and is being implemented in partnership with the Global Fisheries and Resilience Action (GFRA).
The programme seeks to improve transparency, accountability and sustainability within Ghana’s fisheries sector by addressing harmful subsidies that contribute to overfishing and Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing.
Speaking at the launch, the Minister for Fisheries and Aquaculture, Emelia Arthur stressed the importance of building effective compliance systems to safeguard the future of the country’s fisheries industry.
“Effective compliance is not just about meeting international obligations,” she said. “It is about ensuring that our fisheries remain productive, equitable, and sustainable for generations to come.”
According to the Ministry, the project will be implemented through a comprehensive national framework focused on balancing economic growth with marine conservation.
The framework will monitor progress across five key pillars, including subsidies, biological sustainability, livelihoods, distributional equity and governance.
Under the subsidies pillar, authorities will monitor fiscal flows to ensure public funds do not support harmful or capacity-enhancing fishing practices. The biological component will focus on assessing fish stock levels to prevent overexploitation of marine resources.
The livelihoods pillar is expected to protect household incomes in vulnerable coastal communities that depend heavily on artisanal fishing, while the distributional component will promote equity within the fisheries value chain, particularly through gender inclusion and support for women in the sector.
The governance pillar will also seek to strengthen institutional transparency, legal frameworks and regulatory oversight within the fisheries industry.
To facilitate immediate implementation, the first tranche of funding has already been disbursed to operationalise compliance mechanisms.
An 11-member steering committee has also been constituted to supervise the execution of the project. The committee is expected to hold monthly coordination meetings, engage stakeholders regularly and conduct quarterly reviews to monitor Ghana’s progress toward meeting its WTO commitments.
Officials say the initiative positions Ghana to better protect its marine ecosystem while securing the long-term livelihoods of coastal communities dependent on the fisheries sector.
