Push Stepped Up for Permanent CTI-CFF Regional Secretariat

Efforts are ongoing to advance plans for the establishment of the permanent CTI-CFF Regional Secretariat by May 2014.

Following a roadmap endorsed by the 9th Senior Officials Meeting in November 2013, the newly appointed Interim Regional Secretariat (IRS) Chair, Prof. Dr. Ir. Sjarief Widjaja, Ph.D. FRINA, has taken the lead in facilitating the entry into force of the CTI-CFF Agreement to establish the Regional Secretariat. The roadmap targets the Secretariat's establishment by the 5th CTI-CFF Ministerial Meeting in May.

On February 6, the IRS Chair traveled to Putrajaya, Malaysia, to meet with the CTI-CFF Council of Ministers (COM) Chair, Dr. Dato' Ewon Ebin, to discuss options for accelerating the ratification of the Agreement, progress toward establishing the permanent Secretariat, and preparations for a special CTI-CFF Senior Officials Meeting prior to the May Ministerial Meeting. He was accompanied by a delegation of other IRS officials and representatives from CTI-CFF Partner organizations.

Ratification by at least four of the six CTI-CFF member states is required for the Agreement to enter into force. As of this posting, only Malaysia has ratified the Agreement.

On February 17, to help expedite the ratification process, Prof. Widjaja, who is also Secretary-General of Indonesia’s Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, led an IRS and Indonesian delegation to Dili to meet with Timor-Leste’s Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, the Hon. Mariano Assanami Sabino. The delegation discussed bilateral matters and inquired about the status of ratification of the CTI-CFF Secretariat Agreement.

Minister Sabino noted that the document has been forwarded to Timor-Leste’s foreign affairs ministry for further discussion and subsequent approval by the Council of Ministers. He assured the delegation of his commitment to expedite the ratification process.

Similar visits to the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines are being planned.

In a related development, the CTI-CFF Coordination Mechanism Working Group (CMWG) met in Putrajaya on February 18 to deliberate on key organizational documents guiding the transition from the interim to permanent Secretariat. On February 19, the Appointment Committee, tasked with selecting the Executive Director for the Secretariat, convened for the first time to outline the recruitment process.

Australia is assisting the CMWG with operations and budget planning and has contracted Hudson Global Resources, a Sydney-based global recruitment specialist firm, to support the Appointment Committee. Meanwhile, the US Government has extended the US CTI Support Program (USCTI) until September 2014 to continue supporting the Secretariat's establishment. USCTI provides funding and staffing support to the IRS and Technical Working Groups to advance the ratification process and CTI-CFF Regional Priorities at the regional, national, and local levels across all six member countries.