Welcome, then, to Pondy ! And welcome to the ICSF workshop Towards Socially Just and Sustainable Fisheries which focuses on the implementation of the FAO Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-scale Fisheries in the Context of Food Security and Poverty Alleviation (“SSF Guidelines”). FAO’s Committee on Fisheries (COFI)—the world’s inter-governmental forum for fisheries and aquaculture issues— endorsed the SSF Guidelines at its 31st Session in Rome in June 2014. That endorsement is a singular recognition of the work done around the world by several individuals and groups, particularly civil society organizations (CSOs), to valorize small scale fisheries and fishing communities since the adoption of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). The SSF Guidelines were negotiated in a Technical Consultation at the FAO Headquarters in Rome in May 2013 and in a resumed session in February 2014. Attending those meetings were not only governments, but also inter-governmental and international nongovernmental organizations, and 59 representatives of CSOs.
