Sixteen officials responsible for the preparedness and response to oil and chemical spills from PERSGA States gathered from 29 April to 02 May 2024 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, at the Headquarter of the Regional Organisation for the Conservation of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden (PERSGA), for training on oil and HNS spill response as well as on the preparedness and updated incident/spill notification and coordination procedures in the region.

The aim was to refresh participants about information on the contingency and response planning and the IMO requirements, special focus given to the EMARSGA modelling capability and its recent upgrade and additional development. In addition, it was aimed to introduce to the region the newly updated and revised regional contingency Plan counting Hazardous and Noxious Substances spills at sea. The training provided platform for vital discussions on oil and chemical spills issues in the region and fostered an environment conducive for knowledge sharing and exchange of ideas.

Participants discussed the pollution reporting systems, data and knowledge sharing and factors affecting full implementation of IMO conventions related to the intervention and salvage at sea, including incomplete transposition of international and regional conventions and its amendments into national legislation. Recommendations to address the existing barriers were also discussed.

The workshop was organized by the Regional Organisation for the Conservation of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden (PERSGA), through the regional project SFISH “Sustainable Fisheries Development in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden”, which is supported by the World Bank and executed by PERSGA in the region.

The participants were provided with updates on the current efforts undertaken by the Regional Organization (PERSGA) to provide technical support to PERSGA States in order to facilitate regional cooperation for prompt and effective response support to major marine incidents in the region that could have detrimental impacts to the marine ecosystems as well as on national economies.

The training was delivered by an international facilitator with significant experience in HNS spill management, in addition to experts from PERSGA and EMARSGA.

Within the framework of conducting an assessment study on the maritime spills risk involving Hazardous and Noxious substances (HNS) transported by sea in the region and as part of the SFISH project, there was a proposal to conduct a mission on delivering a national workshop to present the project’s overview and tasks to the national stakeholders in Saudi Arabia.

In this respect, the Regional Organization for the Conservation of the Environment of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden (PERSGA) in cooperation with the Ministry of Environment, Water and Agriculture of Saudi Arabia, organized a two-day awareness raising national workshop on assessing the chemical spills risks involving HNS transported by sea in the region. The workshop was conducted at PERSGA Headquarters in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia from 30 to 31 January 2024.The workshop aimed at training local responders and environmental specialists on HNS spill response strategies as well as on the preparedness and incident management aspects of HNS spill response. In addition, assistance in analyzing the current status of HNS spills preparedness in the kingdom was provided via questionnaire with the view to discuss national priorities for update of national and response capacity which is being currently under preparation.

During his opening speech, the Secretary General of PERSGA reminded participants and set the tone on the importance of a well-rehearsed preparedness and response mechanisms that are needed to ensure prompt action to minimize the impact of a maritime oil and HNS spill. To be effective this includes an alerting and response system, resources, trained and exercised personnel and an updated contingency plan. These requirements are prescribed in both the OPRC Convention and the OPRC-HNS Protocol to the Convention. He also stressed that the response to oil pollution requires a certain level of expertise and resources. The response to HNS pollution shares many of these skills and resources but requires a higher degree of personnel protection, assessment instruments and response equipment and techniques. Both responses require careful planning and response systems. An integrated oil and HNS contingency plan build on these shared systems. In order to simplify our general response, it is often better to extend our current oil pollution contingency plans to also address the challenges of HNS.

The sessions of this workshop included technical presentations. More specifically, the training materials delivered consisted of followings topics:

• SFISH project’ overview and the HNS project’s tasks and timesheets
• The EMARSGA center modeling capabilities: OilMap & CheMMap modeling tools
• Introduction to HNS Response
• Chemical Substances & Their Properties
• HNS transportation at sea.
• HNS response preparedness
• Response strategies at sea during chemical spills
• HNS Case studies and Histories

The training materials package were delivered by an international facilitator with significant experience in HNS spill management, in addition to expert from PERSGA.

Moreover, the participants were provided with updates on the efforts made by the Regional Organization (PERSGA) to provide technical support to PERSGA States in order to facilitate regional cooperation for prompt and effective response to major marine incidents in the region that could have detrimental impacts to the marine ecosystems as well as national economies.

The Workshop was attended by about 20 Officials from different national agencies responsible for the conservation of the environment as well as specialists of other relevant stakeholders such as the navy, Ports and transport authorities and private sectors dealing with the pollution responses and planning.

 At the end, PERSGA provided all relevant documents of the training workshop to all the participants. Based on the workshop results and participants feedbacks, the national training workshop was highly successful and met its overall objectives.

A consultation mission was carried out in Djibouti in conjunction with the Ministry of Environment of Djibouti. from January 21 to 24 2024. The mission was implemented within the SFISH project, and as part of the chemical pollution risk assessment involving HNS transported by sea in the region in developing regional contingency Plan, preparedness and response.

The objective of this mission was to gather information from different stakeholders involved in prevention, preparation, emergency crises and the accidental oil and HNS marine pollution responses in Djibouti, in addition to an inventory of the existing capacities to deal with an oil and chemical spill in Djibouti with a view to drawing up a risk assessment report which will lead to establish and update the regional contingency Plan.

Following the round of meetings and discussions a set of findings was shared and submitted to Ministry for the Environment and Sustainable Development. These findings were based on the field visit and after a review of previous feasibility studies and reports compiled by PERSGA.

The EMARSGA Center conducted on 21 and 22 April 2024 in Hurghada (Egypt) a practical training & use of the CHEMMAP and OILMAP in collaboration with RPS modeling Support team. During the training, installation & Handover of CHEMMAP/AIRMAP modeling tools were completed.

This mission was carried out as part of the implementation of the SFISH project funded by the World Bank and executed by the PERSGA in the region, especially focusing on upgrading of the EMARSGA Center regional information system and pollution spill modeling functions to support response.

The CHEMMAP Software is decision support tool that will assist in the long run Member States improving their operational needs which could results in achieving effective monitoring and enable the States to maximize their efforts to protect their marine environment and heath of their population.

The AIR modeling is also added to allows to track the movement and dispersion of volatized chemical from a spill in/on the sea. AIRMAP estimates the flux to the atmosphere from evaporation and volatilization and then calculates the time-varying atmospheric concentration of the release at various heights.