Oiled Wildlife Response comes to West and Central Africa

Sea Alarm achieved two firsts last year: attending a regional conference of the Global Initiative for West and Central Africa (GI WACAF) and teaming up with SANCCOB to make a joint presentation on oiled wildlife preparedness and response at this event. Sea Alarm and SANCCOB (the South African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds) have a long standing partnership and have worked together on several oil spills. In this partnership, Sea Alarm takes a more strategic coordinating role in a response and works with SANCCOB (and similar organisations around the world) to provide hands-on wildlife response expertise. In their joint presentation at the WACAF workshop, which took place in October in Lagos, Nigeria, Saskia Sessions from Sea Alarm and Venessa Strauss (CEO of SANCCOB) outlined what is meant by oiled wildlife response and the importance of wildlife response planning, describing the successful planning model for South Africa where SANCCOB is recognised as the lead wildlife responder. They considered the factors for defining a successful wildlife response operation and examined them across several case studies. GI WACAF is a public/private partnership between the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the International Petroleum Industry Environmental Conservation Association (IPIECA) to enhance countries’ capacity to prepare for and respond to marine oil spills. Sea Alarm is grateful to the IMO and IPIECA for this opportunity.