APA – Abidjan (Cote d’Ivoire) – On Monday 31 July 2023, in Jacqueville, a seaside resort in the south of Cote d’Ivoire, the FAO held a capacity-building workshop on gender issues for stakeholders from national institutions responsible for fisheries management.
Through this workshop, the FAO aims to achieve a degree of equity so that men and women can play their part in the fisheries value chain, said Marie Hortense Guei, FAO Programme Assistant.
She urged participants to take ownership of the gender concept so that they can act as relays in their cooperatives, noting that gender inequality and the inability to understand it and correct it are obstacles to the implementation of development projects in several sectors, including the small-scale fishing industry.
According to the trainer, Juliette Assienan, there is a sexual division of labour in the fishing industry, where catching fish is generally a male activity. Women, on the other hand, are involved in post-capture.
With this training, she hopes that all the opportunities to be seized in the fishing industry will be accessible to women, men and the various stakeholders in their different roles, needs and actions.
Emilienne Zogo, President of COMATPH-CI, welcomed the workshop as an opportunity to gain a better understanding of the roles of women and men in the fisheries sector. But above all, to understand the absence
of women at certain levels.
Hugues Roland Alain Kra, President of the Sassandra (South-East) fishmongers, also welcomed the initiative, saying that he was already working with women in his association, and wanted to learn more about gender issues to raise awareness among those around him.
He also expressed the hope that the FAO would help women to take up fishing as in Cameroon. Women in Côte d’Ivoire’s fishing industry operate in the sales and processing segments.
For the Regional Director of the Ministry for Women, the Family and Children, women have their place in fishing, so if there is gender training, they must be involved in the various programmes.
To achieve this, she says, we need to raise awareness among both men and women, especially in the villages. This training workshop is part of the “Creating an enabling environment to ensure the sustainability of small-scale fishing” and “Coastal Fisheries Initiative – West Africa” projects.
The training workshop runs from Monday 31 July to Thursday 03 August 2023 in Jacqueville.
AP/fss/abj/APA