‘Ensure implementation of National Integrated Maritime Strategy’
Maritime industry players have called on the government to ensure the successful implementation of a National Integrated Maritime Strategy (NIMS) to help address challenges in the sector.
At a stakeholder engagement in Prampram last Saturday, the discussants said the NIMS would be of benefit to the country’s maritime sector, but that could only be realised if the government showed commitment in its implementation.
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“We have seen many laudable ideas put together, but in the end they become stillborn and left to decorate the shelves.
It will be very sad that after all these painstaking efforts, this document is not implemented. If that is the case, then it would be better if it was not started at all,” the Vice Chancellor of the Regional Maritime University, Professor Elvis Nyarko, stated.
NIMS
Work on the NIMS started in 2018 and is expected to be ready next year. The document is currently being reviewed by stakeholders in the maritime industry and other sectors for their inputs.
The NIMS seeks to provide a blueprint on how to make the country’s maritime domain safe and secure, develop a thriving maritime industry and also ensure that the
country turns its marine resources into a thriving economy that will contribute to national development.
It will, among others, focus on strengthening the governance system in the maritime sector, ensure the safety and security of the country’s maritime domain, promote the marine and coastal environment, and also develop a thriving blue economy.
The NIMS is being developed under the auspices of the Security Governance Initiative (SGI), a project between the government of Ghana and that of the United States of America (USA).
Ghana’s lead partner in the SGI project is the National Security Secretariat.
It focuses on four main areas: maritime security, border security, cyber security and the administration of justice.
The National Coordinator of SGI, Mr Osei Bonsu Dickson, said the Ghana Maritime Authority (GMA), the Ghana Navy, the ministries, the media, civil society groups and the private sector have all made inputs into the NIMS.
“Today’s engagement is with maritime players in the private sector, experts in academia, maritime law and maritime governance, among others,” he added.
Significance
Prof. Nyarko said the NIMS was crucial because the ocean and water bodies were as important as land was to the country’s economy.
He said Ghana’s status as an oil producing country, the headquarters of the Africa Intercontinental Free Trade Agreement and its vibrant fishing industry were testament to the fact that the ocean and the economy that revolved around it were the mainstay of the country’s economy.
“Many countries have been able to progress by harnessing the economic benefit of the ocean. Ghana is blessed with such a resource but we are yet to fully harness its potential,” he said.
For his part, the Deputy Director of Ship Inspections and Maritime at the GMA, Captain Emmanuel Kofi Ankamah (retd), said the inputs of all stakeholders in the NIMS were crucial in helping to address its shortfalls.