The
Director-General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety
Agency (NIMASA), Dr. Dakuku Peterside, has reiterated Nigeria’s
commitment to the Ballast Water Management (BWM) Convention, 2004.
Dakuku also said NIMASA remained determined to ensure cleaner oceans
and a safe, secure and environmentally sound maritime sector.
The
Director-General stated these in his keynote address at the opening
of a three-day regional workshop on Ballast Water Management for
Anglophone West and Central African Countries, hosted by Nigeria in
Lagos. He said growing concerns about the adverse effect on the
marine environment of invasive alien species produced by ballast
carried by ships gave rise to the BWM convention of the International
Maritime Organisation (IMO).
He
stated, “Since the advent of the Convention, efforts have been made
to ensure effective implementation of its provisions, among which is
this Regional Workshop.
“The
Regional Workshop, in essence, is to support the timely and
harmonised implementation of the Convention in the West and Central
African Sub-Region with priority and emphasis on the ratification and
implementation of the Convention by member states. This is in
addition to building capacity in the area of Compliance, Monitoring
and Enforcement (CME), Port Biological Baseline Surveys (PBBC), and
risk assessment.”
Dakuku
disclosed that Nigeria, being among the earliest countries to ratify
the Convention, had taken steps to ensure its effective
implementation. Such steps, according to him, include: the
development and gazetting of regulations on Ballast Water Management,
pursuant to the Nigerian Merchant Shipping Act, 2007; development of
an enforcement and implementation manual on ships’ ballast water;
and development of guidelines with reference to relevant IMO
documents for ballast water reception facility and exchange areas.
Others
are: development of guidelines for enforcement of violations of the
regulation on ballast water management; establishment of a globally
recognised and integrated ballast water testing laboratory; and
development of a home-grown concept of Ballast Water Management and
Ports with Acceptable Risk (PWAR), which was presented by Nigeria to
the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) 74, in May 2019,
among other initiatives.
Dakuku
told the workshop participants to come up with meaningful
recommendations and actions that would help realise the objectives of
the convention. He called for more collaborative efforts in the
region to ensure effective protection of the environment.
On
his part, Secretary-General of IMO, Mr. Kitack Lim, who was
represented by the Technical Officer, Sub-Division for Prospective
Measures, Marine Environment Division, Dr. Megan Jensen, noted that
the marine environment and marine resources were vital to the global
economy and sustainable economic growth. He said there was an urgent
need for implementation of a harmonised ballast water management
regime around the world, with special focus on compliance,
monitoring, and enforcement.
The
Ballast Water Management Convention was adopted in 2004 to minimise
the risk of species invasions through ballast water. The Convention
entered into force on September 8, 2017, and, currently, 81 countries
have ratified it, including Nigeria, which was among the first five
countries to endorse the treaty.
The
workshop had in attendance delegates from Guinea Bissau, Sierra
Leone, Sao Tome and Principe, Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, Gambia, and
Liberia.
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