Dodoma — THE government has signed a contract worth 349m/- for implementation of the Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) project to purchase and construct fishing vessels so as to develop fishing in the deep sea.
Speaking in Dodoma yesterday during a signing of the contract between the government and the TANSHEQ Company, the Permanent Secretary in the Prime Minister's Office (Policy, Parliament and Coordination), Dr Jim Yonazi said the project is expected to be completed in 75 days.
TANSHEQ is a consulting firm based in Tanzania offering services in the areas of environmental management, occupational health and safety, quality management, as well as managing social impacts.
"Tanzania has a lot of resources in water; in order to ensure that we stimulate our economy through the blue economy the government has found it important to build large fishing vessels that can fish in the deep sea and be able to get sea products, thus contributing to the nation's economy.
"Before building these vessels, we must assess what could happen and if there could be any negative effects how we can prevent such a situation," he said.
Dr Yonazi said that after the assessment, a feasibility study would be done to allow the construction of the fishing vessels where four vessels will be built for Zanzibar and five for Mainland Tanzania to facilitate fishing activities throughout the country.
"When these vessels are completed, they will contribute a lot to the economy of our country, through the blue economy," he said.
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Dr Yonazi also made a call to the TANSHEQ Director, Lusako Mwanjali to ensure that he carefully supervises implementation of the project so that it can be completed on time and allow other stages of the implementation of fishing vessels construction to continue.
In addition, he asked all stakeholders from Tanzania Fishing Company (TAFICO) and Zanzibar Fishing Company (ZAFICO) as well as stakeholders from the ministry to ensure that they cooperate with TANSHEQ to ensure that the evaluation work is feasible and completed on time.
"This country is ours; everyone should be determined to make sure that he or she does something new in performing their roles so that the work can be completed successfully for the positive development of our country," he said.
On his part the TANSHEQ Chief Executive Officer, Mwanjali, said the main goal of the implementation of the assessment is to ensure that the project of purchasing fishing vessels has positive impacts in the society and the environment in general.
He said that after completing the evaluation process, an Impact control strategy (environment and social management plan) would be provided and that it would be used as a guide when the ship purchase project is implemented.
