Thirteen countries in the Pacific Region have endorsed the implementation of the project at country level. The project is active at regional, sub regional and national levels. The project is jointly administrated by UNDP and FAO with dual reporting systems. At the regional level key project deliverables have been the successful delivery of the annual management options committee (MOC) meeting in November that feeds into the annual WCPFC meeting. The 2015 MOC resulted in a total of nine submissions to the WCPFC meeting. On the MCS side, the project supported the annual FFA MCS working group meeting in March which feeds MCS related recommendations into the annual Forum Fisheries Committee (FFC). National program support positions are in place in SPC and key activity deliverables are on target. FFA has agreements in place for aspects of project implementation with the Pacific Community (SPC), The Parties to the Nauru Agreement Office (PNAO) the Te Vaka Moana (TVM) arrangement, WWF and the Pacific Island Tuna Industry Association. The project has facilitated two meetings of the Project Steering Committee and both the FAO and UNDP component annual work plans and budget have been endorsed.

FFA project management has been challenged by the dual reporting requirements of FAO and UNDP and the need to adapt FFA Financial Reporting processes to meet FAO and UNDP requirements. This matter has not been helped by delays in the recruitment of the FFA based Project Finance Officer. Collectively this has resulted in delays in the approval of reconciliations and associated delays with the process of funds transfer. However, thanks to cooperative efforts from all parties and diligent assistance from the FFA Finance Section, these matters have now been resolved. Technical reporting has not been an issue and all reports have been submitted on schedule. The project design and associated country status reports was prepared in 2010 and is thus now out of date is certain areas. This is being addressed initially through the project baseline study but will also require ongoing updating at the national level.

The project target is to continue with project implementation in accordance with the agreed annual work plans and proposed annual targets. There is a need to engage effectively at the national level with project beneficiaries and this will likely require a greater commitment to country visits by project personnel. The project provides technical assistance and support to FFA members in the preparation and implementation of the WCPFC Science Committee (SC) and Technical Compliance Committee (TCC) and to other WCPFC meetings (IWG on Catch Documentation Schemes (CDS) and IWG in Electronic Monitoring and Reporting (EM and ER). FFA project personnel have been substantively involved in technical aspects of both these key areas.

FFA Members Fisheries Administrations and associated stakeholders They have benefited from the project to date by being well informed on key fisheries management and MCS issues and being able to fully and actively participate in WCPFC processes and comply with WCPFC management measures (CMMs) and the annual compliance risk assessment. This includes ensuring national laws and regulations are updates, Port State Measures processes are in place and fisheries administrations are technically well informed.