Training Workshop on MARPOL/Port Reception Facilities for Port Authorities and Reception Facility Operators in West & Central Africa Ports organised by PENAf in collaboration with Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA) and the Ports Management Association of West and Central Africa (PMAWCA)
Theme: Working Together on Environmentally Sound Management of Ship Wastes: Challenges and Opportunities
11th – 13th March 2024
Tema, Ghana.
WELCOME TO PENAf
Most African ports have in the last decade seen institutional restructuring and reform in a bid to not only modernise infrastructure but to also enhance productivity, efficiency and quality of service delivery. This has successfully attracted private sector involvement in the ports and significantly improved port operational performance. The reform progress however does not reflect conscious environmental and sustainability improvements in the ports. It has mostly focused on renovating and modifying port infrastructure to strengthen the individual economic positions of the ports. Integrating the restructuring with environmental roles and actions to achieve economic, social and environmental sustainability remain limited, unsystematic and fragmented.
Dr. HARRY BARNES-DABBAN, Executive Coordinator
However, in the face of continual decline of the overall global environmental quality and increasing pressures on world resources, African ports as part of the global maritime community are faced with a reality they cannot ignore. They are obliged to take responsibility in applying and committing themselves to a green transition with innovations necessary to meet sustainable development obligations required of them.
African ports share common environmental and sustainability challenges, but the ports inherently operate as fragmented individual entities with little recourse to the linkages of these challenges among them.
Improving sustainability is a challenge to ports globally but it is also a driver for change. It can only be tackled through partnerships and collaboration, if its full benefits must be realised. The ports sector connects many actors in a chain. No port in the chain can be really effective if viewed in isolation. Actions impacting one port can have an impact throughout the entire chain.
African ports must therefore of necessity initiate proactive and innovative actions and mechanisms that integrate environmental sustainability considerations into the overall port planning, policy making, operations and management to promote their sustainable development. The drivers inducing the institutional restructuring and reform of African ports are equally imperative for nurturing and supporting the environmental sustainability of the ports. The ports must therefore collaboratively pay attention to understanding the dynamics of their institutional reform, appearance and participation of the private sector in port operations, global environmental and sustainability practices and obligations, and the common character of their environmental and sustainability challenges to co-develop solutions and actions for their sustainable development.
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MARPOL 73/78 and Port Reception Facilities Training Workshop
11 th – 13 th March, 2024
Tema, Ghana
A Training Workshop on MARPOL implementation and Port Reception Facilities operation organised for Port Authorities and Port Reception Facility Operators in West & Central Africa Ports by PENAf in collaboration with Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA) and the Ports Management Association of West and Central Africa (PMAWCA) attracted participants from Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana, and the Republic of Congo. Aimed at supporting the human capital development for improving environmental sustainability performance in African ports, the workshop sought to have private port reception facility operators work together with a common front and voice in taking up agency and both local and regional levels to define rules and norms for their operation and functioning in common and harmonised approaches.
For further clarification, contact: hbarnesdabban@penaf.org; hbarnesdabban@gmail.com
Ports Environmental Network–Africa #PENAf in collaboration with Ghana Ports & Harbours Authority #GPHA has organised a two-week training on Effective MARPOL Implementation and Efficient Operation of Port Reception Facilities for a delegation from the Port Authority of Bata #BataPort in Equatorial Guinea. The delegation was taken through the legal requirements, rights and obligations of MARPOL and its six technical annexes; environmental assessment for installation and operation of port reception facilities; as well as the Ghana process and experience in that regard. They also observed a hands-on practice of ship waste inspection, discharge and treatment in Ghana’s Tema and Takoradi ports.