Compliance Committee

Roles and Duties

The Compliance Committee is an advisory body of the Commission, which was set up in 2003.  With more emphasis being placed on compliance in the recent years, the Commission decided to strengthen the Compliance Committee in 2009, by redefining its terms of reference. It is constituted of policy makers (Commissioners) and fisheries monitoring, control and surveillance (MCS) practitioners.

The main activities of the Compliance Committee are as follows:

• Review all aspects of CPCs individual compliance with IOTC Conservation and Management Measures;
• Review information relevant to compliance from IOTC subsidiary bodies and from Reports of Implementation submitted by CPCs,
• To identify and discuss problems related to the effective implementation of, and compliance with, IOTC Conservation and Management Measures, and to make recommendations to the Commission on how to address these problems.

The Compliance Committee is supported by one Working Party.  The primary objective of this working party is to lead technical discussions, to prepare assessments and documents, to alleviate the workload, and to address the time constraints of the Compliance Committee.

The Compliance Committee is assisted in its work by the Compliance Section, which is seated within the Secretariat’s structure.  Compliance monitoring is done primarily on the basis of a questionnaire which is circulated by the Secretariat, and which has to be responded to on an annual basis.  In addition to this, many resolutions contain reporting requirements, which CPCs must honour.  Reporting requirements relate to various aspects of CMM implementation, such as providing the Commission with specific information on CMM implementation, or with data and statistics.

Current Chairperson Dr Indra Jaya (Indonesia), 2nd term ends at the close of the CoC in 2027.	Current Vice-Chairperson Mr Zahor El Kharousy (Tanzania), 2nd term ends at the close of the CoC in 2027.