Kenya ready to adopt regional maritime plan
The government has expressed commitment to promote regional maritime co-operation and a stable maritime environment to contribute to regional maritime economic prosperity. Maritime and Blue economy Cabinet Secretary Salim Mvurya said Kenya is committed to adopt a common regional strategy for exploitation of the Blue Economy.
Mvurya was speaking in Zambia during a meeting of ministers in charge of Shipping and Maritime from the East and Central African region.
Under the umbrella of the Intergovernmental Standing Committee on Shipping (ISCOS), the Ministers from Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo expect to come up with a common regional joint approach to drive the growth of the Blue Economy within the region.
Training curriculum
Among the approaches is to see member states pursue the harmonisation of training curriculum and the mutual recognition of certificates from the Maritime Education Training Institutes in the region. Mvurya said formation of ISCOS by states in the region was out of the realisation and need to have coordinated approaches on matters of shipping and maritime transport. “It is therefore critical that we support the drive by ISCOS to develop a regional maritime transport policy which will guide and provide a baseline on realization of regional objectives for the sector,” he added.
The meeting saw ministers from the countries come up with a draft road map to guide development of the Blue Economy in the region, which will be presented to the ministers on Friday for adoption. “We highly appreciate the role of ISCOS in its advocacy for competitive shipping services for our region and providing the shared platform for supporting member states in order to develop their Maritime economies,” said Mvurya. The CS said Kenya with three main ports (Mombasa, Lamu and Kisumu) has the potential to be the regional transshipment hub.
