May 19, 2022

Global Fishing Watch welcomes partnership with Benin to combat illegal fishing

Collaboration on open data and technology to bolster maritime surveillance in West Africa

London, United Kingdom, May 18, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — LONDON, May 19, 2022 – A new partnership agreement between Benin and Global Fishing Watch aims to strengthen monitoring, control and surveillance of fishing activities within the waters of the West African State.

Under the memorandum of understanding, Global Fishing Watch will provide technical support, including fisheries analysis, capacity building and training on its vessel monitoring tools. To track its fishing fleet, Benin is establishing a vessel monitoring system, or VMS, and has formally agreed to share its data via the Global Fishing Watch map—the first African nation to commit to making its fishing fleet publicly visible.

Benin recently hosted in the large port city of Cotonou the first workshop under the new partnership, bringing together participants from Global Fishing Watch and various government agencies to develop actions to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and advance collaboration through open and shared data.

“We are committed to eradicating illegal fishing from our waters and taking all action necessary to secure sustainable fisheries,” said the Honorable Gaston Cossi Dossouhoui, Minister for Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, Benin. “Through our partnership with Global Fishing Watch, we can strengthen our ability to monitor fishing activity, enforce the law and demonstrate our commitment to transparency in support of a blue economy. We encourage other African States to join us in this initiative to rid our waters of illicit activity.”

Captain (Navy) Fernand Maxime Ahoyo, Maritime Prefect of Benin added, “Global Fishing Watch’s tools will reinforce Benin’s actions to protect its maritime area.” Captain Ahoyo also acknowledged support from the non-profit organization, EcoBenin in facilitating engagement between the government of Benin and Global Fishing Watch.

“Greater transparency in fishing activity is an effective and cost-efficient means of driving more compliant behavior at sea. It allows law-abiding fishers to be rewarded, while those with missing information can be investigated and enforcement action more targeted,” said Dame Mboup, Global Fishing Watch’s program manager for West and Central Africa. “Violations by unauthorized vessels are prevalent off West Africa’s coast; Benin is demonstrating leadership in using cutting-edge technology and open data to combat illegal fishing.”

Persistent IUU fishing represents a considerable challenge for Benin and other coastal States in the Gulf of Guinea—a vast and diverse region spanning approximately 3,500 miles (5,633 kilometers) of coastline from Senegal to Angola. IUU fishing accounts for nearly 40 percent of all the fish caught in West Africa and threatens the ability of the region’s developing countries to maximize the use of their ocean resources.

In addition to the partnership with Benin, Global Fishing Watch has signed letters of intent with Cameroon, Gabon, Guinea, Mauritania and Senegal to strengthen collaboration on governance tools, capacity transfer and analysis. The Regional Fisheries Commission for the Gulf of Guinea and the Sub-regional Fisheries Commission have also expressed their interest in joining Global Fishing Watch’s vision for greater fisheries transparency, recognizing that regional cooperation and information sharing is needed to combat IUU fishing.

“West African countries rely on fish as a vital source of protein, income and employment for nearly 7 million people. But this region has seen its fish stocks decline drastically,” added Dame Mboup. “Regional collaboration is critical to eliminate IUU fishing and restore fish populations. Global Fishing Watch is excited to support a growing number of West African States working together to share fishing data and harness technology to safeguard their marine resources and promote economic security.”

Countries in the Gulf of Guinea recently stepped up the fight against IUU fishing and related crimes. Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Togo, through the Fisheries Committee for the West Central Gulf of Guinea (FCWC)—an intergovernmental organization that promotes regional cooperation in fisheries management—launched the Regional Monitoring, Control and Surveillance Center to monitor fishing and related activities in the Gulf of Guinea.

In support of regional efforts to combat IUU fishing, Global Fishing Watch and the international nonprofit, TM-Tracking launched a pilot project with Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Senegal and the FCWC to provide authorities with satellite tracking data, analysis and training needed to assess a fishing vessel’s recent operations and compliance risk. The collaboration will harness a new tool called vessel viewer, which was developed by the two organizations and provides vital information on a vessel’s identity, fishing activity, port visits and transshipments to help assess the need for inspection and port access.

With support from the Bloomberg Philanthropies, Moore Foundation, OAK Foundation and Oceans 5, Global Fishing Watch is committed to working with States to publicly share their vessel monitoring data and make its analytical tools and innovative technologies available to help enhance maritime surveillance.

“Achieving sustainable and equitable management of fisheries is critical,” said Melissa Wright, Vibrant Oceans Initiative Lead at Bloomberg Philanthropies. “Fisheries support the health and well-being of coastal communities, and Bloomberg Philanthropies is excited for the opportunity to expand the number of organizations that make fishing information available and accessible to governments, civil society and the public. This is an important step in the fight against illegal fishing – a problem that requires all hands on deck.”

Global Fishing Watch is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing ocean governance through increased transparency of human activity at sea. By creating and publicly sharing map visualizations, data and analysis tools, we aim to enable scientific research and transform the way our ocean is managed. We believe human activity at sea should be public knowledge in order to safeguard the global ocean for the common good of all.

Attachment

Global Fishing Watch promotes ocean sustainability through greater transparency of human activity at sea.

Sarah Bladen
Global Fishing Watch
+44 79 20333832
sarah@globalfishingwatch.org

May 19, 2022

Advance Local is New Sophi.io Customer

TORONTO, May 18, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Advance Local, one of the largest media groups in the United States operating 10 leading news and information organizations and reaching 55 million people monthly, has quadrupled their subscription goal using Sophi Content Paywall Engine. Faced with advertising pressures exacerbated by the Coronavirus, Advance Local increased subscription conversions 45% using Sophi.io, an AI-powered automation, optimization and prediction platform developed by The Globe and Mail. Their success with Sophi has also earned them a spot as a finalist in the Digiday Media Awards, announced this week.

Neil Katz, Chief Customer Officer at Advance Local, said, “We wanted to see how much farther Sophi could take us, so we tested Sophi Content Paywall on one of our largest sites. The results were transformative. We were hoping for a 10% lift in conversion rate and Sophi delivered four times that result. We’re continuing to roll out Sophi solutions across more of our sites as we speak.”

Advance started using Sophi Content Paywall Engine on one of its largest sites, cleveland.com, to get better insights into the value of their content and fuel their new subscription business. The technology uses advanced natural language processing (NLP) to analyze every piece of content and select which articles to put behind a paywall. It picks only those articles where the subscription revenue opportunity outweighs the advertising revenue forgone.

During an experiment where Advance could see how Sophi performed side by side with their existing paywall, Sophi presented roughly the same amount of paywalls and generated a 45% lift in the total conversion rate, while also uncovering pockets of content that editors didn’t anticipate would generate subscriptions.

John Hassell, Senior Vice President and Editorial Director at Advance Local, said, “We wanted to see if Sophi’s content paywall could increase subscriber acquisition by 10% and it blew that goal out of the water. We’re feeling good about the platform and the way it is showing us just how valuable our editorial content is to our audience.”

Advance Local is also a finalist in the Digiday Media Awards, in the category of Best Subscription or Membership Product, for their work using Sophi Content Paywall Engine.

“Advance Local is an incredibly innovative organization that we’ve watched push the boundaries and we’re very excited to be working with them,” said Mike O’Neill, Co-Founder and CEO of Sophi.io. “We’re seeing great value come from the content paywall they’ve implemented and we’re excited to introduce some other cutting edge technology into this very strong brand.”

About Advance Local

Advance Local (www.advancelocal.com) is one of the largest media groups in the United States. It operates 10 leading news and information organizations and reaches 55 million people monthly across multiple platforms with its high-quality journalism. They are dedicated to unrivaled local journalism that improves the lives of millions of people.

About Sophi.io

Sophi.io (https://www.sophi.io) was developed by The Globe and Mail to help content publishers make important strategic and tactical decisions. It is a suite of AI and ML-powered automation, optimization and prediction solutions that include Sophi Site Automation, Sophi for Paywalls and Sophi for First Party Data. Sophi also powers one-click automated laydown of template-free print publishing. Sophi is designed to improve the metrics that matter most to your business, such as subscriber retention and acquisition, engagement, recency, frequency and volume.

Contact Us

Jamie Rubenovitch
Head of Marketing, Sophi.io
The Globe and Mail        
jrubenovitch@globeandmail.com
416-585-3355

May 19, 2022

More than 59 million internally displaced in 2021

A record 59.1 million people were displaced within their homelands last year, or four million more than in 2020, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Thursday, citing the latest Global Report on Internal Displacement (GRID).

IOM has welcomed the report, produced by its partner the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), calling it a valuable tool for the organization, humanitarians, and governments, in supporting communities affected by disasters and other crises.

“Understanding, managing, and adapting to human mobility trends is crucial to ensure humanitarian assistance and essential services are reaching people where they are most needed,” the UN agency said.

Running from disasters

For the past 15 years, most internal displacement was triggered by disasters, with annual numbers slightly higher than those related to conflict and violence.

Last year was no exception, according to the report. Weather-related events such as floods, storms and cyclones resulted in some 23.7 million internal displacements in 2021, mainly in the Asia-Pacific region.

IOM warned that with the expected impacts of climate change, and without ambitious climate action, numbers are likely to increase in the coming years.

Conflict and violence

Meanwhile, conflict and violence triggered 14.4 million internal displacements in 2021, a nearly 50 per cent increase over the previous year.

The majority took place in Africa, particularly Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, while Afghanistan and Myanmar saw unprecedented numbers of displacement.

Young lives affected

The report also includes a special focus on children and youth, who account for more than 40 per cent of the total number of those internally displaced last year.

It looks at the impacts of displacement on their well-being now and in the future, and fills data and knowledge gaps that are critical to finding durable solutions.

IOM added that gaps remain in understanding and addressing internal displacement in conflict.

Driven by data

The agency has partnered with the IDMC – which is part of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) – to provide reliable and accurate data through its Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM), the world’s largest source of primary data on internal displacement.

The two organizations signed an agreement four years ago to join forces on improving data and to accelerate policymaking and action.

IOM has also co-chaired the International Data Alliance for Children on the Move (IDAC) since 2020.

The coalition brings together governments, international and regional organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), think tanks, academics, and civil society, to improve statistics and data on migrant and forcibly displaced children.

Source: United Nations

May 19, 2022

Commitment to Ending Child Labour Must Never Waver, Deputy Secretary-General Stresses in Message for Global Conference on Its Elimination

Following is the text of UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed’s video message to the fifth Global Conference on the Elimination of Child Labour in Durban, South Africa, today:

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,

My sincere thanks to the Government of South Africa for hosting this landmark event. As a daughter of the African continent, it gives me special pride to address the fifth Global Conference on the Elimination of Child Labour — the first to take place in Africa.

This Conference is a source of tremendous hope for the 160 million children around the world who are trapped in child labour. Children who work in mines and in fields. On construction sites or hidden behind the walls of private homes in domestic servitude. And those denied the right to fully develop, physically and mentally.

Too often they are denied their right to education. If they attend school at all, their performance suffers due to their extra workload, and they are likely to drop out early. Their right to health is also put at risk and accidents and diseases can mark them for a lifetime. Child labour is — quite simply — wrong. And the only solution to this crisis is a rights-based approach. One that recognizes and upholds the rights that every child has to health, education and protection. A right to a future.

The ILO [International Labour Organization], as a values-driven organization and leader of the worldwide movement against child labour, has a critical role in this work. The universal ratification of Convention No. 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labour marked a historic first for the United Nations. Children everywhere now have essential legal protection, regardless of the level of economic development in their countries and communities.

So the tool exists. Our challenge now is to fully implement it. This means seizing the opportunity to renew our commitment made in Oslo 25 years ago. It means actively convening and listening to our civil society partners on the ground, who remain steadfast champions in the fight against child labour in every corner of the world, as the efforts of Nobel Laureate Kailash Satyarthi in India powerfully demonstrate. And it means gathering more investment and support for all of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals that affect our progress on child labour — from poverty and hunger to social protection, decent work and gender equality.

Education is a clear example of this. A lack of educational access and opportunities fuels child labour. And around the world, education is in turmoil. COVID-19, climate change, and political and economic crises are compounding a pre-existing learning crisis that has left the education-related Sustainable Development Goals badly off-track.

We simply cannot allow children — today and tomorrow — to experience catastrophic losses in learning and well-being. That’s why the Secretary-General decided to convene the Transforming Education Summit this September as part of Our Common Agenda. The Summit will be a once-in-a-generation opportunity to come together to chart a new path for education — including closing the digital divide, so every child, everywhere, can have a chance at accessing a quality education. And the Summit also represents a new path to eliminate child labour. It will urge dramatically expanded financing flows for education and all efforts under Sustainable Development Goal target 8.7, the elimination of all forms of child labour by 2025.

Ladies and gentlemen, our commitment to ending child labour remains strong. It must never waver. One hundred sixty million children are counting on us. We must not let them down. With your steadfast support, we can ensure that future generations of children can enjoy what every child deserves. The simple blessing of a normal, healthy and safe childhood. Let’s make child labour a thing of the past.

Thank you.

Source: United Nations