Madam Arthur made the call during the launch of the West Africa Sustainable Ocean Programme (WASOP)-Pillar, which is aimed at strengthening sustainable ocean governance and regional cooperation in fisheries management across the region.

The yellow card is a system often issued by the EU as a warning to countries whose fisheries governance is judged to fall short of stated regulations and standards, with implications including socioeconomics.

Ghana was issued with a yellow card in 2021, with the EU pointing to irregular transshipment at sea, locally known as ‘saiko’, and monitoring, control and surveillance issues, among others.

The minister stated that “I am appealing to the EU to lift the yellow card ban on Ghana, which is due to IUU. It’s been five years that we have been on it, and we have done a lot of work on it.”
She said in the past nine months, her outfit and the government had put in a lot of measures to reverse the ban and urged fishers to strictly adhere to measures, stressing that failure to do so puts Ghana at the risk of being issued with a red card.
She added that such a move would affect the exportation of fish from Ghana to EU countries, depriving the country of revenue.

Madam Arthur uses the occasion to announce that the government has commenced a process of developing a Blue Economy Strategy under the Office of the President, with significant progress achieved.

She said together, the new Fisheries and Aquaculture Act, 2025 (Act 1146), and Ghana are putting in place the relevant legal and policy frameworks to ensure that national actions reinforce the collective regional agenda for a sustainable and resilient ocean economy.