The 1st Threatened Species Working Group Regional Exchange, Manila, Philippines

About This Event

During the first Threatened Species Working Group Meeting in Putrajaya, Malaysia on March 2017, the group decided to create a pool of experts on threatened species particularly on marine turtles, sharks and rays and marine mammals to provide technical guidance and support to the TSWG as it strives to achieve the targets of Goal 5 of the Regional Plan of Action (RPOA). Initially, Philippines was tasked to develop the first draft of the terms of reference (TOR) for the creation of the pool of experts. The draft TOR was circulated to all member countries for their additional inputs and comments. During the Pre-SOM meeting in November 2017, the revised draft was presented to the group again for further discussion and development. A number of comments and suggestions were raised to further enhance the TOR and so the group decided to hold another workshop to fully develop the TOR before the pool of experts can be established

In the same Pre-SOM meeting, the group also decided to develop the monitoring and evaluation indicators for Goal 5 which has long been targeted. Since the M&E indicators has to be approved by SOM before it can be utilized, the WG agreed to begin the initial discussions on the indicators during the first TSWG event in 2018 and develop it further in the succeeding TSWG activities and finalized the draft in time for SOM14.

Hence, the focus of this TSWG meeting is to finalize the draft TOR for the creation of a pool of experts on threatened species and to initiate the drafting of the TSWG M&E indicators (please see CTI ME Operations Manual 2014). Additionally, discussions on the targets of Goal 5 will also be conducted particularly on how to complete the region-wide conservation plans on TS and the region-wide TS status report.