Perpetual drought, livestock ban, internal conflicts,… strongly affected the Federal State of Puntland in the north-eastern portion of Somalia resulting in lack of food security for its local communities. The fishing sector has good prospects of making remarkable contributions towards the reconstruction of Somalia.

 

The Building A Future Foundation works in collaboration with the Nedsom Foundation of Netherlands and Somalia which aims at establishing a sustainable fishing industry in Bosaso, Puntland. This long term socio-economic development project involves several stakeholders including the fishery communities represented by fishing associations, fish traders, the local Government, a local financing institution and Nedsom Foundation.

 

The project is implemented in two phases. The first phase which is already implemented consists in the construction of a 700 m2 shipyard allowing the construction of fishing boats, the set-up of a strong network of fishing associations, capacity building training for a group of young Somalian in boat building activities and the order of a 13,8 m trimaran fishing boat with sails developed by the Building A Future Foundation and built by Ceynor Foundation in Sri Lanka.

 

The second phase that has to be implemented consists in strengthen the fishermen with new technologies, producing fishing boats, establishing a credit facility for the fishermen in cooperation with the fishing associations and a local financing institution and setting up a commercial company to distribute the fish products locally as well as in Yemen and Kenya.

It is estimated that the project will help 509 direct beneficiaries. Taking into account that each person has a family of about 6 persons including children and grandparents, the project should benefit a total of 3054 persons.

 

The project that is implemented by Nedsom Foundation with the assistance of Rainbow Sustainable Solutions of the Netherlands is already supported by Oxfam Novib in the Netherland, the Housing association on North Holland provinces and the Municipality of Haarlemmermeer and is open to financing to implement the second phase.