Innovations for investment: financing small-scale fisheries in Thailand

The Global Network for Capacity Building to Increase Access of Small-Scale Fisheries to  Financial Services (CAFI-SSF) organized a webinar titled “Innovations for Investment: financing small-scale fisheries in Thailand” on 25 October 2023. The event was co-organized with the Asia-Pacific Rural and Agricultural Credit Association (APRACA) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

The event was attended by fisheries finance stakeholders from Thailand, the Philippines, and several other organizations from the Asia-Pacific region. The knowledge-sharing session had three distinguished speakers. The programme discussion began with a presentation by Dr. Raymon Van Anrooy, Senior Fishery Officer/Team Leader, Fishing Technology and Operation Team, who introduced and provided an overview to the participants of FAO’s Multi-Disciplinary Fund Joint Project: Financing innovation for sustainable fisheries with the private sector, which was implemented successfully by the Bank for Agriculture and Agriculture Cooperatives (BAAC), Asia-Pacific Rural and Agricultural Credit Association (APRACA) and the SouthEast Asian Fisheries Development Corporation (SEAFDEC). He shared with participants and briefly highlighted the prominent project work conducted in Thailand; i) the establishment of a national network for financing innovation for sustainable fisheries in Thailand (ThaiNet- SSF), which is linked with the CAFI-SSF Network, ii) project identification of key finance and fisheries stakeholders and training material drafted by APRACA and BAAC, that focusses on training finance officers and financial institutions to address the needs on financing and adapting to fisheries finance programmes particularly to finance small-scale fisheries (SSF), iii) surveys on fish value chain finance, iv) assessment of the sustainability of fishing technologies and operations in Thailand- options for innovations.

Further to this Dr. Thomas Gietzen, FAO International Consultant, shared survey results conducted during the project within three provinces in eastern Thailand. He discussed the scheme of the various actors in the fish value chain, showed the analysis results of how economic benefits are distributed in the value chain and lessons learned to understand opportunities for financial institutions in the fisheries sector. The third presentation by Mr. Sukchai Arnupapboon from Training Department, SEAFDEC  focused on how technological innovations in fishing vessels can reduce operational costs as well as environmental impacts, while improvements in technology can increase fishing efficiency, product quality, and safety at sea and thus enhance the working conditions of fishers.

The closing remarks made by Dr.Prasun Kumar Das, Secretary General, APRACA that The Guidelines for microfinance and credit services in support of small-scale fisheries in Asia have been widely accepted by APRACA member organizations.  He also expressed several APRACA members have shown interest in supporting the studies on the cost and flow of product analysis through country-level programs and the development of capacity-building material for small-scale fisheries finance in their respective countries. He stated to get more fishers/fish farmers involved, it is important to delve into their requirements both from technology as well as the capacity building needs to increase access to finance. 

The programme discussion concluded with key suggestions for next steps as follows:

1. Development of financial literacy training materials for small-scale fishers
2. Reporting formats to be developed for financial service providers (FSPs) on financial service provision to the fisheries and aquaculture sectors.
3. For more details, the webinar recording can be accessed from the here