The Responsible Fisheries Training course has been running since 2006 with the RFA taking the lead on its coordination since 2011. The training is aimed at fishers, compliance officers and observers in the large scale commercial fishing industry.

In order for the courses to run efficiently, a group of facilitators need to be trained with the skills to facilitate this course.

There will be a train the trainer course held on the 25th of March.

What being a facilitators involves:

• Co-facilitation of courses which are held about once a month or one every two months.
• A course is run over two days and therefore you will need to be available for 2 full days.
• Sometimes short notice of less than 2 weeks is given for a course.
• Remuneration is available for facilitators.

What is required for the train the trainer course:

• If the potential facilitator has not attended a course before, they will need to be available to sit in on a course on the 19th and 20th of March.
• The train the trainer will then be held on the 25th of March.
• The facilitators will then be expected to co-facilitate/facilitate small sections of the course on the 26th and 27th of March and in any of the training courses scheduled after that until they are deemed competent enough to be an approved facilitator for the course.

Background and rationale

For responsibly managed fisheries, it is important to understand the dynamics of individual populations and the ecosystem as a whole. It is equally important to have appropriate policies and regulations in place which incorporate all aspects of an ecosystem approach, however, the fact that this is a necessary but not a sufficient condition is apparent.

The people on the ground like the fishers themselves, fisheries observers or fishery control officers have been working in this industry for years and in most situations for many generations and they have a wealth of knowledge regarding fishing and the environment. Therefore it is vital that fishers who are at the coal face of fisheries management are empowered to understand how their knowledge underpins fisheries management and the thought process behind management decisions.

Observers on the other hand require appropriate training to not only collect verifiable data on which management decisions are based, but also raise the awareness and understanding of fishers at sea.

Compliance officers, who enforce management actions, cannot do so effectively if they are not equipped with a thorough understanding of fisheries regulations, why the regulations exist and how to implement them. The training proposed in this document aims to address this need.

Benefits of the proposed training programme will ultimately result in fisheries acting more responsibly through improved compliance to fisheries regulations and implementation of voluntary measures and thereby increasing the likelihood of long-term sustainability and access to global markets.

Good head start for education

Many fishers have little tertiary education. A training programme such as this one would uplift the skills of fishers and in this way aid in poverty alleviation.

Please feel free to contact us if you are interested in participating in training, adapting our training to your needs or delivering training. We would love to train your trainers to deliver this training course or adapt it for your fishery or local circumstances.

If you are interested in attending this course please email your CV to Alice Johnson at alice.ajconsulting@gmail.com by the 19th of March 2014 and you will be notified by the 20th of all the details for the course.