2020
This publication was produced at the request of the United States Agency for International Development. It was 
prepared independently by Della E. McMillan, Lynn Hurtak, Annie Dela Akanko, and Evans Arizi.
EVALUATION
Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building 
Support Project Final Performance Evaluation Report
FISHERIES AND 
COASTAL 
MANAGEMENT 
CAPACITY BUILDING 
SUPPORT PROJECT 
FINAL PERFORMANCE 
EVALUATION
February 28, 2020
Contracted under 641-A18-FY14-IL#007
Prepared by:
Della E. McMillan
Lynn Hurtak
Annie Dela Akanko
With Technical Advisor Evans Arizi
Submitted by:
USAID/Ghana Monitoring, Evaluation, and Technical Support Services (METSS) II Project
Photo credit: Centre for Coastal Management, University of Cape Coast. Photo Archive. February 28, 
2020. Photo taken by FCMCBSP drone.
DISCLAIMER
The author’s views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of the United States 
Agency for International Development or the United States Government.
i | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
CONTENTS
ACRONYMS................................................................................................................................................ II
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY............................................................................................................................ V
1.0. EVALUATION OVERVIEW ...........................................................................................................1
1.1. EVALUATION PURPOSE.................................................................................................................................................. 1
1.2. EVALUATION QUESTIONS ............................................................................................................................................. 1
2.0. PROJECT BACKGROUND .............................................................................................................3
2.1. MECHANISM DESCRIPTION ........................................................................................................................................... 3
3.0. EVALUATION METHODS AND LIMITATIONS.........................................................................8
3.1. EVALUATION METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................................................................... 8
3.2. LIMITATIONS ................................................................................................................................................................14
4.0 FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS ...................................................15
4.1. EVALUATION QUESTION 1: TO WHAT EXTENT HAS THE USAID/UCC FCMCBSP ACHIEVED ITS INTENDED 
GOAL AND OBJECTIVES AS DEFINED BY THE RESULTS FRAMEWORK?.........................................................................15
4.2. EVALATION QUESTION 2: WHAT UNINTENDED OUTCOMES HAVE THE USAID/UCC FCMCBSP’S CAPACITY 
STRENGTHENING ACTIVITIES ACHIEVED RELEVANT TO IMPROVING SUSTAINABLE MANAGEMENT OF GHANA’S 
MARINE AND COASTAL RESOURCES? ...........................................................................................................................28
4.3. EVALUATION QUESTION 3: TO WHAT EXTENT HAS USAID/UCC FCMCBSP COLLABORATED WITH OTHER 
USAID-FUNDED PROJECTS SUCH AS THE CSLP, SFMP, AND GOG PARTNERS, SUCH AS THE MOFAD, OTHER 
DONOR PROJECTS, AND THE PRIVATE SECTOR TO ACHIEVE THE OVERALL PURPOSE OF STRENGTHENING 
CAPACITY FOR SUSTAINABLE FISHERIES AND COASTAL RESOURCES MANAGEMENT? ...............................................31
4.4. EVALUATION QUESTION 4: TO WHAT EXTENT HAS THE PROJECT ADDRESSED THE GENDER ISSUES RELATED TO
CAPACITY-BUILDING AMONG THE DIFFERENT GROUPS OF BENEFICIARIES AND WHAT HAS THE IMPACT BEEN?....35
4.5. EVALUATION QUESTION 5: TO WHAT EXTENT ARE THE USAID/UCC FCMCBSP CAPACITY STRENGTHENING 
INTERVENTIONS LIKELY TO CONTINUE AFTER UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT (USG) SUPPORT ENDS.................39
4.6. EVALUATION QUESTION 6: WHICH USAID/UCC FCMCBSP CAPACITY-BUILDING ACTIVITIES ARE THE MOST 
AND LEAST EFFECTIVE IN IMPROVING SUSTAINABLE MANAGEMENT OF GHANA’S MARINE AND COASTAL 
RESOURCES? ..................................................................................................................................................................50
ANNEX I. FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS TABLE ...............................53
ANNEX II. EVALUATION STATEMENT OF WORK ...........................................................................71
ANNEX III. PERFORMANCE INDICATOR TRACKING TABLE.........................................................88
ANNEX IV. FIELD WORK........................................................................................................................94
ANNEX V. ADDITIONAL TABLES.......................................................................................................138
ANNEX VI: TECHNICAL REVIEW OF THE FCMCBSP MARINE AND COASTAL RESEARCH 
AND RESOURCE ASSESSMENTS (ACTIVITY 2.1.1-2.1.5) AND MARINE AND COASTAL 
FISHERIES DATABASE (2.1.6). .............................................................................................................180
ANNEX VII. THE HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF THE CENTRE FOR COASTAL 
MANAGEMENT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CAPE COAST...............................................................223
ANNEX VIII. DISCLOSURE OF ANY CONFLICTS OF INTEREST ..................................................225
ii | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ACRONYMS
AAS Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy
ACE Africa Center of Excellence
ACECoR Africa Centre of Excellence in Coastal Resilience
ANCoRS Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security
AOR Agreement Officer’s Representative
CBFMG Community-Based Fisheries Management Group
CBO Community-Based Organization
CCM Centre for Coastal Management
CDCS Country Development Cooperation Strategy
COO Chief of Operations
COR Contracting Officer’s Representative
CSIR Council for Scientific and Industrial Research
CSLP Coastal Sustainable Landscapes Project
CSO Civil Society Organization
DAA Development Action Association
DANIDA Danish International Development Agency
DFAS Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
DO Dissolved Oxygen
DO 2 Development Objective 2
EG Economic Growth
EQ Evaluation Question
FASoG Fisheries and Aquaculture Society of Ghana
FCMCBSP Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project
FCR Findings, Conclusions, and Recommendations
FGD Focus Group Discussion
FY Fiscal Year
iii | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
G2G Government to Government 
GC Gas Chromatography
GIS Geographic Information System
GITA Ghana Inshore Trawlers Association
GoG Government of Ghana
ICCAT International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna
ICFG Integrated Coastal and Fisheries Governance
ICM Integrated Coastal Management
ICZM Integrated Coastal Zone Management
IGA Income-Generating Activity
IR Intermediate Result
IRD Research Institute for Development
ISO International Standards Organization
JFCoM Journal of Fisheries and Costal Management
KII Key Informant Interview
KNUST Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology
KRA Key Result Area
M&E Monitoring and Evaluation
METSS Monitoring, Evaluation, and Technical Support Services
MoFAD Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture Development
MOU Memorandum of Understanding
M.Phil. Masters of Philosophy
NGO Non-Governmental Organization
NRM Natural Resource Management
Ph.D. Doctor of Philosophy
PIR Project Intermediate Result
PITT Performance Indicator Tracking Table
PMB Project Management Board
iv | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q Questionnaire
SFMP Sustainable Fisheries Management Project
SOW Statement of Work
Sub-IR Sub-Intermediate Result
TEC Total Estimated Ceiling
ToT Training of Trainers
UCC University of Cape Coast
UDS University for Development Studies
UENR University of Energy and Natural Resources
UG University of Ghana
URI University of Rhode Island
USAID United States Agency for International Development
USAID/Ghana United States Agency for International Development’s Ghana Mission
USG United States Government
VC Vice Chancellor
VIP Village Infrastructure Project
VSLA Village Savings and Loan Association
ZMT Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Research
ZOI Zone of Influence
v | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
EVALUATION PURPOSE 
The purpose of this final evaluation was to assess the extent to which the goal and objectives of the 
United States Agency for International Development (USAID)/Ghana University of Cape Coast (UCC) 
Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project (FCMCBSP) have been achieved, 
and how the implementation of project interventions contributed to achieving USAID/Ghana’s Country 
Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) Development Objective 2 (DO 2), “Sustainable and broadly 
shared economic growth,” and its Sub-Intermediate Result (Sub-IR) 2.4.2, “Improved local community 
management of natural resources.” The evaluation is expected to provide USAID, its implementing 
partners, and stakeholders in the fisheries and coastal management sector with data on outcomes, best 
practices, and lessons learned to inform future programming.
ACTIVITY BACKGROUND
In its most recent CDCS, USAID/Ghana committed to supporting “Improved sustainable management of 
Ghana’s marine and coastal resources” in its DO 2 results framework and funded three projects to achieve 
this result: 1) Sustainable Fisheries Management Project (SFMP) (October 2014-April 2021); 2) Coastal 
Sustainable Landscapes Project (CSLP) (October 2013-September 2019); and 3) FCMCBSP (October 
2014-March 2020). FCMCBSP was expected to work with SFMP and CSLP to increase the core capacity 
of UCC’s Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (DFAS) “to strengthen UCC’s capacity in 
developing and providing quality and relevant education programs, practical research, and advisory services that 
will support the management of fisheries and coastal resources on a sustainable basis to enhance the nation’s 
social and economic development.”
1 The project was designed and executed by DFAS through a five-year 
government-to-government (G2G) grant from USAID/Ghana to achieve two overlapping Project
Intermediate Results (PIRs) and four Key Result Areas (KRAs):
• PIR 1: Organizational and human capacity strengthened: 
- KRA 1.1: Improved infrastructure; and
- KRA 1.2: Increased technical and scientific knowledge; and
• PIR 2: Increased information and knowledge for natural resource management:
- KRA 2.1: Increased marine and coastal research and assessments; and 
- KRA 2.2: Communication, extension, and outreach improved. 
EVALUATION DESIGN AND LIMITATIONS
Evaluation Purpose and Methods: The evaluation team2 used a mixed-methods approach to 
respond to six evaluation questions (EQs) and five sub-questions. This included: 1) a document review;
2) a review of FCMCBSP’s monitoring data; 3) key informant interviews (KIIs) and focus group 
discussions (FGDs); 4) a set of five online questionnaires targeted to five of the seven stakeholder 
groups; and 5) a technical review of the five FCMCBSP research studies and FishCoMGhana online 
database by FCMCBSP Final Evaluation External Technical Advisor Evans Arizi. Altogether, the team 
interviewed 304 people from six stakeholder groups.
1 UCC. 2014. Detailed Program Description. Provision of Technical and Financial Support to the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences, University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: UCC for USAID/Ghana. (July 24, 2014). Pg. 11.
2 Team Leader Della E. McMillan, Co-team Leader Lynn Hurtak, M&E Survey Specialist Annie Dela Akanko, and External 
Technical Advisor Evans Arizi. 
vi | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
After collecting the data, the evaluation team engaged in an intensive review of the themes emerging 
from the interviews for each of the six EQs. It then organized two debriefing sessions with project staff 
and USAID/Ghana staff to validate the themes from the analysis of the data, which are presented in a 
summary table (Annex I).
There were several limitations to this evaluation.
• The principal methodological limitation was constructing a sampling frame for the online 
questionnaires since FCMCBSP did not have a stakeholder database and had to rely on old sign￾up sheets from different events. To manage this limitation, the FCMCBSP Support worked with 
his colleagues to reconstruct a list of all individuals who benefitted from the different trainings in 
the principal stakeholder institutions. Once this sampling frame was constructed, the evaluation 
team was able to select a representative sample.
• Another limitation was the difficulty of attributing any result to FCMCBSP alone since some 
results were the effect of joint activities with SFMP and CSLP. To manage this risk, the project
attempted to highlight the critical role both SFMP and CSLP played in providing financial and 
non-financial support to key activities and results. 
• A third limitation was the field portion of the interviews coincided with UCC’s winter break, 
which made it more difficult to interview the current students who had or were currently 
benefitting from the project and harder to track down the former students’ current contact 
information because many were no longer using the same email addresses. To manage this risk, 
FCMCBSP: 1) launched a tracer survey of all current and former student beneficiaries and 
provided the results of this tracer survey to the evaluators; and 2) requested the FGDs at the 
four sister institutions include as many student beneficiaries as possible.
FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS
EQ 1: To what extent has the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP achieved its intended goal and 
objectives as defined by the results framework?
The evaluation team confirmed through the online questionnaires, FGDs, KIIs, and a review of the 
project’s summary data that FCMCBSP successfully strengthened the core organizational and human 
capacity of UCC in sustainable fisheries and coastal management; and that DFAS and Centre for Coastal 
Management (CCM) have leveraged this increased capacity to attract two additional major grants from 
the World Bank and Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) and four minor grants from 
the National Geographic Foundation, the French Embassy, Australian Aid, and the World Academy of 
Science. Due in large part to FCMCBSP’s start-up investment and the additional grants it attracted, UCC 
is increasingly recognized as the lead university-based center for fisheries and coastal management in 
Ghana and an emerging regional West African center of excellence.
Based on the external technical review and feedback from the FGDs, KIIs, and online questionnaires, the 
evaluation team concluded FCMCBSP increased the supply of high-quality marine and coastal resource
assessments, and that this information is currently being used and/or likely to be used to inform some of 
the most critical national-level policy debates on fisheries and coastal management issues. Another 
important achievement of FCMCBSP was the creation of several critical platforms—e.g. FishCoMGhana,
the biannual policy workshop, Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management (JFCoM), and Fisheries and 
Aquaculture Society of Ghana (FASoG)—major stakeholder groups all ranked as having greatly 
increased their access to the information and networks needed to continue to update the knowledge 
and skills they acquired under FCMCBSP. 
The community-based FGDs conducted by the evaluation team confirmed FCMCBSP’s internal reports 
showing the project’s community-based livelihood activities were largely unsuccessful in increasing 
vii | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
opportunities for natural resource management (NRM). In contrast, the evaluation confirmed 
FCMCBSP’s non-governmental organization (NGO) partners’ reports, which showed the project
successfully co-piloted a new model for promoting ecological monitoring of wetlands with two schools 
in the affected communities, resulting in a host of under-documented positive changes in the lives of 
both the students and their communities. The same community-based studies confirmed the active 
engagement of FCMCBSP—in combination with SFMP and CSLP—on the wetlands monitoring activity 
contributed to the technical and organizational capacity of the two most active NGOs working on 
coastal management and fisheries issues in Ghana—Hen Mpoano and Friends of the Nation.
EQ 2: What unintended outcomes have the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP’s capacity 
strengthening activities achieved relevant to improving sustainable management of 
Ghana’s marine and coastal resources?
Some of the key unintended outcomes of FCMCBSP include the: 1) dual-degree, joint grooming of 
graduate students and J-term programs with the University of Rhode Island (URI); 2) media training 
initiatives; 3) biannual policy conferences; 4) undergraduate research grants; and 5) creation of JFCoM
and FASoG. 
Many of these unintended outcomes created the chief mechanisms that non-UCC stakeholders who 
responded to the online questionnaires reported they are using to build and maintain the professional 
skills and knowledge they developed under FCMCBSP, and some of the same outreach activities have
increased the organizational capacity of the institutions they are attached to. To date, however, it is hard 
to track the participation of or benefits accruing to particular groups and sub-groups of stakeholders 
from some of these unintended outcomes since they were not fully tracked due to the way FCMCBSP
managed its M&E system, which did not include a learning component during its first three years.
EQ 3: To what extent has the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP collaborated with other USAID￾funded projects such as CSLP, SFMP, and Government of Ghana (GoG) partners such as 
Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture Development (MoFAD), other donor projects, and 
the private sector to achieve the overall purpose for strengthening capacity for sustainable 
fisheries and coastal resources management?
Most stakeholders felt FCMCBSP’s broad-based collaboration with a representative sample of the 
sector’s most critical institutional and project partners strengthened their personal capacity and that this 
capacity-building is contributing to NRM in Ghana. To date, however, it is hard to show a solid link 
between these capacity-building efforts and the types of institutional capacity-building FCMCBSP was 
designed to facilitate because it never developed a beneficiary database or focused communication 
strategy to facilitate communication, capacity-building, and coordination with key partners.
EQ 4: To what extent has the project addressed the gender issues related to capacity￾building among the different groups of beneficiaries, and what has the impact been?
The FGDs and KIIs confirm project data that shows FCMCBSP successfully increased the pipeline of 
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) and Master of Philosophy (M. Phil.)-educated women for leadership in the 
fisheries and coastal management sector. The project was less successful in building the capacity of the 
growing number of women government staff working on fisheries and coastal management issues. For 
example, only 23 percent of the 71 district-level MoFAD staff who participated in FCMCBSP’s short￾term trainings and workshops were women despite evidence from MoFAD that about 50 percent of 
senior technical staff are women. The community-based interviews confirmed project data showing
FCMCBSP was very successful in ensuring women participated actively in the FCMCBSP livelihood 
activities and female students participated at equivalent levels as male students in the community-based 
wetlands monitoring activities. 
viii | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
EQ 5: To what extent are the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP capacity strengthening 
interventions likely to continue after United States Government (USG) support ends?
The high levels of stakeholder buy-in observed during the project are likely to continue even though 
conditions for sustaining some of the project’s key platforms—including some widely considered to be 
examples of best practice—are either assured or likely (but not fully assured) except for the 
FCMCBSP’s support for a series of community-level livelihood diversification activities. Some key 
second-generation institutional challenges identified in the FGDs and online questionnaires that need to 
be addressed during the transition year following the end of FCMCBSP include: 1) developing, pilot 
testing, and scaling up the business plans needed to sustain some of the most critical infrastructure, 
equipment, vehicles, extension, communication, and outreach platforms created and scaled up under 
FCMCBSP and SFMP that are not scheduled for support under the Africa Centre of Excellence in 
Coastal Resistance (ACECoR) project; 2) developing a standard health and safety manual and 
certification process for all CCM and DFAS activities; 3) shifting the focus of CCM’s strategic planning 
process and donor support away from FCMCBSP to the wider mission of CCM and DFAS in Ghana and 
West Africa and the new grants FCMCBSP helped attract; and 4) co-defining with the UCC 
administration an action plan for streamlining CCM and DFAS procedures that complies with UCC rules 
and regulations for accounting, procurement, equipment installation and maintenance, health and safety 
standards, M&E, communications, database management, and updates to inform ongoing and projected 
new activities to the new rules and regulations of the World Bank and other new donors CCM may be 
adding over the next five years; and an action plan for identifying new UCC-level mechanisms for 
compensating faculty for time spent on the grants and ensuring grant-getting and grant-related activities 
count toward UCC tenure and promotion decisions.
In addition to this, stakeholders interviewed in the FGDs and online questionnaires identified a number 
of examples of best practices and lessons learned, many of which could be applied to other types of 
capacity-building projects and UCC’s next generation of CCM and DFAS programming.
EQ 6: Which USAID/UCC FCMCBSP capacity strengthening activities are the most and 
least effective at improving sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal 
resources?
The genius of FCMCBSP was its commitment to the identification, pilot testing, and partial scale up of a 
large number of different platforms that built the capacity of different stakeholder groups from the 
grassroots to the upper echelons of the Ghana government. For this reason, it is not surprising that the 
stakeholders who responded to the online questionnaires ranked some of the same activities—like the 
short-term trainings—as both most and least effective. The four items ranked highest by UCC-based 
stakeholders were the: 1) renovation and equipping of the offices, lecture and computer rooms, and 
coastal research library; 2) support for the post-graduate training program; 3) full operationalization of 
CCM; and 4) biannual policy conferences. The activities ranked highest by the government, NGOs, and 
producer groups were the: 1) short-term trainings; 2) biannual policy conferences; and 3) workshops.
The UCC staff and board ranked FCMCBSP’s community-based capacity-building and livelihood activities 
as least effective. Not surprisingly, a relatively high percentage of government stakeholders ranked the 
research and policy review activities, which they were less involved in, as least effective. The relatively 
high percentage of media, NGO, producer organization, and government stakeholders who ranked the 
conferences, workshops, and short-term trainings as least effective (while others in these groups ranked 
them as most effective) seems to be directly related to whether or not they had personally received an 
invitation to the event. The lack of a beneficiary stakeholder database made it difficult to document the
wider impact of these activities on stakeholder capacity.
1 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
1.0. EVALUATION OVERVIEW
1.1. EVALUATION PURPOSE
The purpose of the final evaluation was to assess the extent to which the goal and objectives of the 
United States Agency for International Development (USAID)/Ghana University of Cape Coast (UCC) 
Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project (FCMCBSP) have been achieved, 
and how the implementation of project interventions contributed to achieving USAID/Ghana’s Country 
Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) Development Objective 2 (DO 2), “Sustainable and broadly 
shared economic growth,” and its Sub-Intermediate Result (Sub-IR) 2.4.2, “Improved local community 
management of natural resources.”3 The evaluation specifically identifies project components which either 
worked well or not, and provides USAID, its implementing partners, and stakeholders in the fisheries 
and coastal management sector with data on outcomes, best practices, and lessons learned to inform 
future programming.4
The primary audience and intended users of the FCMCBSP evaluation are the USAID/Ghana Mission, 
UCC, and its Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (DFAS), which are expected to use some of 
the evaluation results and lessons learned to inform future strategic planning and program development.
1.2. EVALUATION QUESTIONS
USAID/Ghana asked the evaluation team to focus on six evaluation questions (EQs) and five sub￾questions: 
1. To what extent has the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP achieved its intended goal and objectives as 
defined by the results framework? 
1.a. IR 1: Strengthened organizational and human capacity: Has organizational and human 
capacity been strengthened as a result of improved infrastructure (Key Result Area 
[KRA] 1.1) and increased technical and scientific knowledge (KRA 1.2)?
1.b. IR 2: Increased information and knowledge for natural resource management (NRM): 
Have efforts to increase marine and coastal research and resource assessment (KRA 
2.1) and improved communication, extension, and outreach (KRA 2.2) resulted in 
increased information and knowledge for natural resource management?
1.c. Has the implementation of community-based activities resulted in increased 
opportunities for improved natural resource management and/or income generation 
amongst the rural families, and has it impacted the target communities?56
2. What unintended outcomes have the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP’s capacity strengthening activities 
achieved relevant to improving sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal 
resources? 
3. To what extent has the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP collaborated with other USAID-funded projects 
such as Coastal Sustainable Landscapes Project (CSLP), Sustainable Fisheries Management 
3 USAID. 2019. Draft UCC FCMCBSP Evaluation Statement of Work (SOW). Pg. 1. April 24, 2019. (Annex II)
4 USAID. 2019. Draft UCC FCMCBSP Evaluation SOW. Pg. 1. April 24, 2019. (Annex II)
5 The evaluation team recommended adding sub-questions 1.c.i and 1.c.ii in order to clarify the original expectations of the 
project for these activities. These changes were approved by both METSS II and USAID/Ghana.
6 Although the evaluation team recommended adding two additional sub-questions (1.c.i and 1.c.ii), Monitoring, Evaluation, and 
Technical Support Services (METSS) II recommended deleting them in the last draft of the Final Performance Evaluation Work 
Plan, and the evaluation team accepted that recommendation.
2 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Project (SFMP), and Government of Ghana (GoG) partners such as the Ministry of Fisheries and 
Aquaculture Development (MoFAD), other donor projects, and the private sector to achieve 
the overall purpose of strengthening capacity for sustainable fisheries and coastal resources 
management?
4. To what extent has the project addressed the gender issues related to capacity-building among 
the different groups of beneficiaries, and what has the impact been?
5. To what extent are the USAID/UCC FCMCBSP capacity strengthening interventions likely to 
continue after United States Government (USG) support ends?
5.a. Is stakeholder buy-in likely to continue or be increased after the current project
expires? 
5.b. What are the lessons learned and best practices, and from which stakeholders or 
beneficiaries, in achieving results?
6. Which USAID/UCC FCMCBSP capacity strengthening activities are the most and least effective 
at improving sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal resources?
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2.0. PROJECT BACKGROUND
2.1. MECHANISM DESCRIPTION
2.1.1. CONTEXT
Over 60 percent of Ghana’s industries lie within the coastal zone, where marine capture fisheries are 
the major economic activity. The Western Region, in particular, is dependent on renewable and non￾renewable natural resources that include not only fisheries, but also mining, oil and gas, and forestry. 
These and other activities focused on economic growth and development may, at the same time, 
threaten the health of Ghana’s coastal ecosystems. Ghana’s Environmental Action Plan cites strong 
evidence that Ghana’s coastal ecosystems are already seriously degraded.7 Ghana is faced with growing 
challenges in managing its coastal and marine resources, as evidenced by the dramatic decline of fish 
stocks and the degradation of coastal resources. Further concerns include the overexploitation of 
fisheries at artisanal and industrial scales using unsustainable fishing methods and the pollution of coastal 
ecosystems. Coastal ecosystems—especially estuaries, lagoons, and their associated wetlands—are 
becoming increasingly impacted by activities within their catchment areas, with deforestation, intensive 
agriculture, damming, and irrigation all changing the nature of material fluxes (water, sediment, nutrients, 
and pesticides). It is apparent Ghana’s marine and coastal resources are being lost or damaged in ways 
that are diminishing biodiversity. This is attributable to many factors, including deficiency in monitoring 
and enforcement of regulations; lack of education, training, research, data gathering, and analysis; and 
low government investments in capacity-building for effective management. The lack of adequate human 
resource capacity, good governance, and well-functioning systems impede NRM in Ghana.
Given the growing challenges in managing Ghana’s coastal and marine resources, USAID/Ghana 
identified “improved sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal resources” as one of the key 
results it was supporting under DO 2 of the Mission’s CDCS. FCMCBSP was conceptualized as one of 
three projects designed to achieve this result (Figure 1).
8
7 USAID/Ghana CDCS Fiscal Year [FY] 2013-2019
https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1860/CDCS_Ghana_December_2019_1.pdf
8 The three projects were: SFMP (October 2014-April 2021); CSLP (October 2013-September 2019); and FCMCBSP (October 
2014-March 2020).
4 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Figure 1. FCMCBSP Results Framework in Relation to USAID/Ghana’s DO29
Source: USAID. 2019. Draft Statement of Work (SOW). UCC FCMCBSP Evaluation SOW. Pg. 19 (draft). April 
24, 2019. (Annex II)
In efforts to support training, research, and extension services in marine and coastal management, DFAS 
considered the establishment of a Centre for Coastal Management (CCM) in 1997, which became reality 
in 2010 when the USAID/Ghana-funded Integrated Coastal and Fisheries Governance (ICFG) Initiative 
supported the design and the development of a strategic plan for CCM. Subsequently, CCM was 
approved by UCC’s Academic Board in December 2013 and aims to be a center of excellence and an 
innovative partner in marine and coastal resource science, training, and applied management (Annex VII).
2.1.2. GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
The overall goal of FCMCBSP is “improved sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal 
resources.” Its stated purpose is “strengthened capacity for sustainable marine and coastal resource 
management.” FCMCBSP initially had three Project Intermediate Results (PIRs), which were reduced to 
two by merging expected results in research and extension (Figure 1).
FCMCBSP was expected to collaborate with the two other USAID/Ghana-funded fisheries projects—
SFMP and CSLP—to increase the core capacity of UCC’s DFAS to collaborate with its principal 
government and non-governmental partners. The underlying development hypothesis is that IF
FCMCBSP—in combination with SFMP and CSLP—is successful in (Figure 1):
Strengthening the organization and human capacity of UCC’s DFAS and CCM (PIR 1; Figure 1) through: 
9 Key Assumptions: 1) Absence of disruptions in the academic calendar; and 2) Stable prices of items to be purchased (vehicles, 
furniture, laboratory equipment).
KRA 1.2: Increased 
technical and scientific 
knowledge
KRA 1.1: Improved 
Infrastructure
KRA 2.2: Communication, extension 
and outreach improved
KRA 2.1: Increased marine and coastal 
research and assessments
Overall Goal: Improved sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal resources
FCMCBSP Purpose: Strengthened capacity for 
sustainable fisheries and coastal resources 
management
PIR 1: Organizational and 
human capacity 
strengthened
PIR 2: Increased 
information and knowledge 
for natural resource 
management
Sustainable Fisheries 
Management Project
(SFMP)
Coastal Sustainable 
Landscapes Project
(CSLP)
Assumptions: Absence of disruptions in the academic calendar, stable prices of items to be purchased (vehicles, 
furniture, laboratory equipment)
DO 2 Goal: Sustainable and broadly shared economic growth
5 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Investing in their infrastructure of laboratories, computer rooms, and the library (KRA 1.1; Text 
Box 1); and
• Increasing the technical and scientific knowledge of their research staff, lecturers, technicians, 
and graduate and undergraduate students to carry out research and provide training to students 
in fisheries and coastal management (KRA 1.2; Text Box 1); and
Increasing information and knowledge for natural resource management (PIR 2; Figure 1) by helping 
UCC to: 
• Increase the number and quality of marine and coastal research and resource assessments (KRA 
2.1; Text Box 1); and
• Improve communication, extension, and outreach to all key stakeholders in the sector (KRA 2.2; 
Text Box 1);
THEN the result will be “strengthened capacity for sustainable fisheries and coastal management,” which 
will contribute to USAID’s overall goal of “improved sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal 
resources” (Figure 1).
6 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Text Box 1. Principal FCMCBSP Activities for the Four KRAs (Fiscal Year [FY] 2015-2019)
KRA 1.1: Improved Infrastructure
Activity 1.1.1: Renovating and equipping fisheries and coastal research laboratory
Activity 1.1.2: Refurbishing and equipping office/lecture/computer rooms and library
Activity 1.1.3: Acquisition of vehicles to support educational, training, research, and extension activities 
KRA 1.2: Increased Technical and Scientific Knowledge
Activity 1.2.1: Academic and technical staff capacity strengthening
Activity 1.2.2: Operationalization of CCM
Activity 1.2.3: Support for postgraduate (Master of Philosophy [M.Phil.] and Doctor of Philosophy [Ph.D.]) 
training program
Activity 1.2.4: Undergraduate research grants
KRA 2.1: Increased Marine and Coastal Research and Resource Assessments
Activity 2.1.1: Conducting fisheries stock assessment
Activity 2.1.2: Conducting research and assessment on marine fisheries governance issues
Activity 2.1.3: Research on fish and shellfish of commercial value
Activity 2.1.4: Analysis of value chains of fish trade
Activity 2.1.5: Monitor the biodiversity and health of coastal ecosystems
Activity 2.1.6: Developing marine and coastal fisheries database
KRA 2.2: Communication, Extension, and Outreach Improved
Activity 2.2.1: Developing material and conducting training on integrated coastal management
Activity 2.2.2: Developing material and conducting training on fisheries management
Activity 2.2.3: Developing manuals and updating training materials on climate change adaptation and mitigation
Activity 2.2.4: Developing material and conducting training on the use and application of Geographical 
Information Systems (GIS)
Activity 2.2.5: Engaging policy makers to address coastal and fisheries issues (including two national 
conferences and creation of a new online Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management)
Activity 2.2.6: Building institutional partnerships and collaboration 
Activity 2.2.7: Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities
Activity 2.2.8: Strengthening community-based groups10
Activity 2.2.9: Promoting supplementary livelihoods in coastal communities
Source: UCC. 2014. Detailed Program Description: Provision of Technical and Financial Support at the Department of 
Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: DFAS for USAID/Ghana. July 2014 updated by 
the FCMCBSP Manager and M&E Coordinator. November 15, 2019.
2.1.3. TARGET AREAS AND TARGET POPULATION GROUPS
The principal zone of influence (ZOI) was eight districts in the coastal area of the Western and Central 
regions of Ghana where the project implemented several activities (Annex II; Annex V, Table 32). Four 
of the eight districts also benefitted from community-based supplemental livelihood activities (for snail 
and oyster farming and beekeeping) and strengthening of community-based fisheries management groups 
(CBFMGs) (Annex V, Table 32). In some districts, the project supported applied research and facilitated 
10 Leadership and business advocacy training was done in the eight original communities targeted for livelihood activities under
Activity 2.2.8.
7 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
the participation of officials from the most relevant district offices involved in NRM in the two national 
policy conferences (Annex V, Table 32). In addition to this, short-term training participants were invited 
from government agencies located in 38 districts and municipalities within seven regions of Ghana 
(Annex V, Table 32).
FCMCBSP worked with approximately 1,384 direct beneficiaries, including: 258 staff from national, 
regional, and local government agencies in 38 different municipalities and districts and eight regions; 388 
faculty, staff, graduate, and undergraduate students at UCC and four other major academic institutions 
working on fisheries and coastal management issues in Ghana—the University of Ghana (UG) in Legon; 
the University for Development Studies (UDS) in Tamale; the University of Energy and Natural 
Resources (UENR) in Sunyani; and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in 
Kumasi; 523 community-based resource users and their community-based organizations (CBOs) in the 
Central and Western Regions; 73 journalists attached to 21 media outlets; 120 staff associated with 
national and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and development partners; and 
some of the key staff associated with the major private-sector actors in the fisheries sector, including 
five producer groups and unions.11
2.1.4. PROGRAM IMPLEMENTATION PLAN
FCMCBSP is implemented through UCC’s DFAS under the oversight of the nine-person FCMCBSP 
Project Management Board (PMB) established by the UCC Vice Chancellor (VC). The PMB has fiduciary 
responsibility, serves as an advisory and decision-making authority for the project, has the responsibility 
of approving project work plans and budgets, and monitors its activities on a regular basis. The day-to￾day management of the project is overseen by a Project Manager, with the support of a Monitoring and 
Evaluation (M&E) Coordinator, both Senior Faculty. Since late Fiscal Year (FY) 2015 they have been 
assisted by six FCMCBSP-funded Research Assistants, and added two permanent CCM Research Fellows 
in FY 2018.
11 UCC FCMCBSP monitoring and evaluation (M&E) database, March 2020.
8 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
3.0. EVALUATION METHODS 
AND LIMITATIONS
3.1. EVALUATION METHODOLOGY
The evaluation team used a mixed-methods approach to collect and analyze data to complete the 
performance evaluation within the timeline and budget constraints. The team used document review, 
key informant interviews (KIIs), focus group discussions (FGDs), and online questionnaires targeting key
project beneficiaries and participants to gather quantitative data to support the evaluation findings and 
conclusions. These data-collection methods are described in detail below. The approved evaluation 
work plan contains the initial evaluation team’s methodology and anticipated limitations.12
3.1.1. DOCUMENT REVIEW
In conjunction with the pre-planning process, the FCMCBSP M&E Support developed and stored all 
necessary FCMCBSP documents in a Google Drive folder. A full review of these documents, reports, 
studies, and surveys helped the evaluation team design the instruments for the questionnaires, FDGs, 
and KIIs. The review process also helped the evaluation team:
• Develop a number of summary tables describing the key project activities (Annex V); 
• Carry out a cumulative update of the project’s Performance Indicator Tracking Table (PITT) 
(Annex III);
• Establish a full list of the major project stakeholders and their contact information as a basis for 
sampling (Annex IV, Table 9); and
• Identify the need for the project to develop a comprehensive list (and contact information) of all 
undergraduate and graduate students who received project training and funding.13
3.1.2. DATA COLLECTION INSTRUMENTS
Based on its initial understanding of the project, the evaluation team adopted a mixed-methods approach 
to assess its performance. This methodology and a draft of the research instruments are described in 
the evaluation work plan.14
3.1.3. QUALITATIVE DATA COLLECTION 
Design: In an effort to reduce the complexity of note taking, data entry, and analysis during the planning 
period, the evaluation team opted for single FGD/KII guide that asked a series of questions needed to 
answer the six EQs for all of the stakeholder groups except the two community-based groups (Annex 
IV, Table 11). The single FGD/KII guide was used for all FGDs and KIIs during the data-collection phase. 
While certain groups were asked all of the questions, other questions—like those related to 
12 Della E. McMillan, Lynn Hurtak, and Annie Dela Akanko. 2019. Work Plan Final Performance Evaluation of the Fisheries and 
Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Accra, Ghana: METSS II for USAID/Ghana Economic Growth (EG) 
Office. December 3, 2019. 
13 To address this issue, the evaluation team helped an FCMCBSP research assistant develop a separate follow-up study for all 
UCC graduate students as well as the undergraduate students who benefitted from the undergraduate research grants at UCC 
and its four sister institutions managed by the project (Activity 1.2.4, Text Box 1). 
14 Della E. McMillan, Lynn Hurtak, and Annie Dela Akanko. 2019. Work Plan Final Performance Evaluation of the Fisheries and 
Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Accra, Ghana: METSS II for USAID/Ghana EG Office. December 3, 
2019.
9 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
management and M&E—were asked of only one group. A separate FGD checklist was developed to 
guide the evaluators’ community-level interviews with: 1) two of the four CBFMGs; and 2) two junior 
high school programs to promote community-based wetlands monitoring.
15 Although each case study 
included multiple interviews, the evaluation team used the same guide. The FGD/KII guide was
developed in close collaboration with the FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator and M&E Support.
Sampling: During the same pre-planning process, the FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator and M&E Support 
came up with a preliminary list of 638 key stakeholders in seven groups targeted for FGDs, KIIs, and the 
online questionnaires, plus a list of the ten community groups where FCMCBSP was active (Table 1).
16
The evaluation team attempted to conduct at least one FGD for each of the major stakeholder groups. 
Although this list was developed with the FCMCBSP M&E Support, the final selection of the individuals 
who attended the interview was based on the focal person the Evaluation Team Leader communicated 
with when setting up the interviews (Annex IV, Table 10). 
15 In most cases, these community-level interviews consisted of a series of separate FGDs with different sub-groups—like the 
teachers, community leaders, and students in the case of the two community-based wetlands monitoring sites. In each case, 
however, the interviews were consolidated into a single form and counted as only one FGD.
16 During Step One of the proposed five-step process for determining the sample frame, the FCMCBSP M&E Support alerted 
the evaluation team to a number of unforeseen problems with the development of the lists. The chief problem was most 
records on conference attendance and short-term trainings were handwritten and/or incorrectly typed in. To get around this 
problem the M&E Support embarked on a laborious process of consolidating the lists by stakeholder group before he was able 
to verify the addresses of the stakeholders.
10 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 1. Number of FGDs and KIIs; Number of FGD, KII, and Online Questionnaire Participants; and Percent of Initial Stakeholder List 
Totals from Which Sample Was Drawn for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation, January 2020
Stakeholder Group # of 
FGDs
# of 
KIIs
# of FGD 
Participants
# of KII 
Participants
# of Online 
Questionnaire
Participants
# of People 
Interviewed by KII, 
FGD, or Online 
Questionnaire (No 
double counting)
# of People 
from Which 
Sample Was 
Drawn17
Stakeholder Group 1: 
Project staff, oversight 
committees, 
administrators, and 
technical consultants 
2 10 14 11 21 31 38
Stakeholder Group 2: 
Government agencies 
(local, regional, and 
national)
2 3 15 7 7018 89 261
Stakeholder Group 3: 
Academic and research 
institutions
5 2 35 7 23 64
3.a. UCC (3) (0) (19) (0) (23) (41) 174
3.b. Other universities19
(does not include 
students)20
(2) (2) (21) (2) (0) (23) 51
Stakeholder Group 4: 
Other USAID-funded 
fisheries projects (SFMP 
and CSLP)
0 2 0 4 0 4 N/A
Stakeholder Group 5: 
Local communities, CBOs, 
and resource users
5 2 82 6 9 95
17 Annex IV, Table 9
18 Seventy-three (73) online questionnaires were received. Unfortunately, three of the people were actually employees of UCC. These three employees were deleted from the 
database, which is why only 70 of the 73 questionnaires are included in the analysis in Annex IV.
19 UG, UDS, UENR, and KNUST.
20 Since FCMCBSP did not have an accurate list of all its undergraduate and graduate student beneficiaries, the project conducted its own independent tracer survey. The 
evaluation team was told it would not be appropriate to send a separate survey to the same group, so student beneficiaries were not included in this group.
11 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Stakeholder Group # of 
FGDs
# of 
KIIs
# of FGD 
Participants
# of KII 
Participants
# of Online 
Questionnaire
Participants
# of People 
Interviewed by KII, 
FGD, or Online 
Questionnaire (No 
double counting)
# of People 
from Which 
Sample Was 
Drawn17
5.a. Community-based 
activities
(77) (0) (77)
5.a.1. Livelihood activities (1) —21 (9) 8 communities
5.a.2. Ecological 
monitoring of wetlands (1) (0) (68) 2 
2 communities, 2 
schools, 10 
teachers
5.b. NGO/CBO partners (1) (1) (5) (6)
(9) merged for 
groups 5.b and 5.c (15) 21 (from 8 
NGOs)
5.c. Fisheries producer 
groups/unions (1) (1) (5) (6) (3) 20
Stakeholder Group 6:
Media 1 1 9 1 17 18 70 (21 outlets/ 
stations)
Stakeholder Group 7:
USAID/Ghana 0 1 0 3 0 3 3
Total 194 140 304 638
Source: Annex IV, Tables 9 and 10. 
21 Due to the difficulty of setting up interviews with the actual participants at the second site, the evaluators met with a district official involved in the pilot, which is reported 
under Stakeholder Group 2.
12 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Comparing the number of people interviewed with the original stakeholder list in the evaluation plan, 
this sample was highly representative.
• Stakeholder Group 1: Seventy (70) percent of the current and former staff were interviewed; 
over 200 percent of the project management team and PMB since an exhaustive list of former 
members were also interviewed; and 30 percent of the technical consultants from other 
universities and institutions contracted to execute activities were interviewed.
• Stakeholder Group 2: Twenty-nine (29) percent (42/147) of the government agency 
stakeholders who participated in project-sponsored trainings responded to the online 
questionnaire, and another 22 government officials (some who participated in the training, some 
who did not) participated in the FGDs/KIIs. 
• Stakeholder Group 3: Twenty-six (26) of the 44 (54 percent) faculty in DFAS and other 
departments (who were not project staff or PMB members) responded to the questionnaire 
and/or were interviewed; 23 of the 51 (45 percent) faculty and undergraduate students who 
participated in the undergraduate research fellowship program and other activities were 
interviewed in FGDs. 
• Stakeholder Group 4: The three SFMP staff with the most involvement with FCMCBSP were 
interviewed in an FGD. Since CSLP closed in 2018, the evaluation team was only able to 
interview one person in a KII. 
• Stakeholder Group 5.a: The evaluators conducted interviews with school teachers, 
community leaders, current students, and graduates in both communities (100 percent) where 
FCMCBSP supported ecological monitoring of wetlands through local schools and interviewed in 
three of the eight communities (38 percent) where the project supported community-based 
supplementary livelihood activities.
• Stakeholder Group 5.b: Fifteen (15) of the 21 (71 percent) most active NGO collaborators 
were interviewed in FGDs and/or responded to the online questionnaire. 
• Stakeholder Group 5.c: The evaluation team interviewed three of the 20 (15 percent) most￾active fisheries producer groups/unions that collaborated with the project. 
• Stakeholder Group 6: Eighteen (18) of the 70 media representatives (26 percent) who 
participated in project trainings were interviewed in FGDs or responded to the online 
questionnaire. 
• Stakeholder Group 7: All three USAID officers most involved with the project were 
interviewed in two FGDs.
The chief exception was the under-representation of former graduate students who benefitted from the 
project because the interviews were conducted at the end of the winter break. To address this issue, 
FCMCBSP conducted a tracer survey for all current and former students—25 percent of current and 
former UCC students and 20 percent of student beneficiaries at the other universities responded.22
Despite the interviews occurring over winter break, the evaluators did manage to interview five 
undergraduates and seven graduate students at UCC and 15 undergraduates in the FGDs at their four 
sister institutions—UG, UDS, UENR, and KNUST.
Data Collection: The FGDs and KIIs were conducted in Accra, Cape Coast, Takoradi, and through 
field visits to two district-level administrative centers where the project-supported community-based 
22 Twenty-five (25) percent of DFAS students polled in the tracer survey and 20 percent of the undergraduate students at the 
four sister institutions responded to the questionnaire. In addition, the evaluators interviewed 24 students (14 male and 10 
female) in person at UCC and 12 students (five undergraduate and seven graduate) responded to the online questionnaire. Six 
students participated in the FGDs at the four sister institutions. (Annex IV, Table 9).
13 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
activities were implemented (one in Western Region and one in Central Region) (Annex IV, Table 8). 
The FGDs and KIIs were carried out in English and local languages with a translator where required.
One evaluation team member was tasked with taking master notes for each interview. Another kept 
track of all the interviews (including documentation of all individuals the team met), cleaned up all data 
collected using the data collection tools, and transferred the data to a master file. She also conducted an 
initial analysis of the FGD for each stakeholder group that was then summarized in order to identify the
frequency and disparity trends of different stakeholder responses to the questions (Annex IV, Tables 11 
and 12). Altogether, the evaluation team completed 34 FGDs/KIIs23 with 194 persons, including the 
community-based groups (44 males; 111 females; and 39 junior and elementary school students24) (Table 
1).
3.1.4. QUANTITATIVE DATA COLLECTION 
In an effort to provide a quantitative verification of the qualitative data collected by the FGDs and KIIs, 
the evaluators proposed sending a series of online questionnaires to all the individuals who participated 
in the FCMCBSP-sponsored short-term trainings and conferences.25
Design: During the pre-planning period, the evaluation team developed five questionnaires that asked a 
series of questions to answer the six evaluation questions. Each questionnaire was adapted to a specific 
stakeholder group and developed in close collaboration with the FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator and M&E 
Support.
Sampling: The evaluation team proposed a two-step process for determining the sample for the online 
questionnaires in the evaluation work plan:
• Step 1: The FCMCBSP M&E Support created a sampling frame of 344 stakeholders for which 
FCMCBSP had verified email addresses.
• Step 2: The evaluation team verified the contact emails and phone numbers of the 344 people 
and determined the usability of the email addresses and validation of the contact information for 
276 of the 344 individuals on the original contact list.
26
Data Collection: The Google Forms questionnaires were sent out to all 276 individuals with validated 
email addresses on January 15, 2020. Two reminders were sent to all non-respondents from January 19-
23, 2020. In addition, the M&E Support made personal calls to some of the non-respondents and sent 
out reminders through the media’s WhatsApp group to encourage responses. The analysis in this report 
is based on the 143 people (38 females and 105 males; 52 percent response rate) who responded to the 
questionnaires in the ten days they were live (Table 1; Annex IV, Table 13).
3.1.5. COMMUNITY-BASED FOCUS GROUP DISCUSSIONS
Regions and Districts: The evaluation team conducted face-to-face interviews in four of the eight 
districts in the coastal areas of the two regions of Ghana where the project was most active, including 
four of the eight districts that benefitted from FSMCBSP support for CBFMGs. The four CBFMGs visited 
23 For the purposes of the evaluation, the community-based interviews—which included 77 people—are listed as just one FGD 
even though the form was structured so different stakeholder groups (e.g., female and male beneficiaries) were interviewed 
separately. If the number of community-based interviews are subtracted, there were 30 FGDs/KIIs with 117 people.
24 The evaluation team did not get an accurate gender breakdown of all of the students interviewed in one village.
25 Della E. McMillan, Lynn Hurtak, and Annie Dela Akanko. 2019. Work Plan Final Performance Evaluation of the Fisheries and 
Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Accra, Ghana: METSS II for USAID/Ghana EG Office. December 3, 
2019. Pp 19-20. 
26 Since the contact list was based on sign-up sheets, many email addresses and telephone numbers had changed.
14 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
were chosen from a matrix that classified them in terms of their level engagement with the project—
two of the four were classified as “highly engaged” and two as “less engaged.” The final choice of 
individuals chosen to participate in the FGDs and small KIIs was determined by the focal point at the 
targeted institution. 
3.1.6. OTHER DATA SOURCES 
Given the highly technical nature of FCMCBSP’s five research studies and the FishCoMGhana online 
database (Activity 2.1.1-2.1.6), USAID/Ghana and the FCMCBSP Project Manager and M&E Coordinator 
recommended the evaluation team add a fourth member to the team during the final review of the work 
plan tasked with reviewing the technical quality and impact of these five activities. Since the most 
qualified individual who could be found to do this consultancy obtained his graduate degree through 
funding from USAID’s SFMP and was applying for a job in DFAS, it was determined he would not be 
considered part of the core team but serve as a Technical Advisor. His draft report to the team (which 
is co-authored by the FCMCBSP Project Manager) is presented in Annex VI.
3.2. LIMITATIONS
There were several limitations to this evaluation.
• The principal methodological limitation was constructing a sampling frame for the online 
questionnaires since FCMCBSP did not have a stakeholder database and had to rely on old sign￾up sheets from different events. To manage this limitation, the FCMCBSP Support worked with 
his colleagues to reconstruct a list of all individuals who benefitted from the different trainings in 
the principal stakeholder institutions. Once this sampling frame was constructed, the evaluation 
team was able to select a representative sample.
• Another limitation was the difficulty of attributing any result to FCMCBSP alone since some 
results were the effect of joint activities with SFMP and CSLP. To manage this risk, the project
attempted to highlight the critical role both SFMP and CSLP played in providing financial and 
non-financial support to key activities and results. 
• A third limitation was the field portion of the interviews coincided with UCC’s winter break,
which made it more difficult to interview the current students who had or were currently 
benefitting from the project and harder to track down the former students’ current contact 
information because many were no longer using the same email addresses. To manage this risk, 
FCMCBSP: 1) launched a tracer survey of all current and former student beneficiaries and 
provided the results of this tracer survey to the evaluators; and 2) requested the FGDs at the 
four sister institutions include as many student beneficiaries as possible.
15 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
4.0 FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS, 
AND RECOMMENDATIONS
4.1. EVALUATION QUESTION 1: TO WHAT EXTENT HAS THE USAID/UCC
FCMCBSP ACHIEVED ITS INTENDED GOAL AND OBJECTIVES AS 
DEFINED BY THE RESULTS FRAMEWORK? 
4.1.1. FINDINGS
EQ 1.A: Has organizational and human capacity been strengthened as a result of improved 
infrastructure (KRA 1.1) and increased technical and scientific knowledge (KRA 1.2)?
The activities under PIR 1 (organizational and human capacity strengthened) were designed to build 
UCC’s capacity for this type of leadership through investments in:27
• Improved infrastructure (KRA 1.1), including: 1) renovating and equipping UCC’s fisheries 
and coastal research laboratory; 2) refurbishing and equipping offices, lecture rooms, the 
DFAS/CCM computer room, and the CCM library; and 3) acquiring vehicles and other field 
equipment like research boats to support educational, training, research, and extension 
activities.
• Academic and technical staff capacity strengthening (KRA 1.2) by: 1) providing 
capacity-building grants and training for staff so they could update the UCC curricula and 
research programs; 2) facilitating the full operationalization of CCM; 3) increasing the number of 
post-graduate scholarships and field research awards to allow UCC to attract top students to 
support their research and extension activities; and 4) providing small grants to undergraduate 
students in DFAS and related departments to support final-year research and project work.
Since the impact of the KRA 1.1 and KRA 1.2 investments are completely intertwined, the evaluators 
based their assessment on: 1) the project’s own internal data used to track the impact of these 
investments on the three principal organizational units being targeted for these investments—DFAS, 
CCM, and UCC as an institution; 2) the principal stakeholders’ perceptions about how this investment 
affected the organizational capacity of these units and the human capacity of the staff, faculty, and 
students attached to these units; and 3) the key factors the principal stakeholders identified as having 
contributed to or detracted from the effective execution of the project.
DFAS: When FCMCBSP started, DFAS was threatened with extinction28 due to low graduate and 
undergraduate enrollments (Annex V, Table 42). FCMCBSP support allowed DFAS to:
• Provide professors and students with functional office space, equipment (computers, research 
vehicles), laboratory, and library resources (subscriptions, physical space) needed to conduct 
quality research.
• Update the skills and training of eight senior faculty and two lab technicians responsible for the 
graduate student training and research programs (Annex V, Table 36).
27 UCC. 2014. Detailed Program Description: Provision of Technical and Financial Support at the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences, University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: DFAS for USAID/Ghana. July 2014. Pp. 12-14.
28 The term “extinction” was used in an FGD with senior faculty to describe the very real threat that the department’s faculty 
and courses would be absorbed into a different department. Since DFAS included some of the leading coastal and fisheries 
experts in the country, this would have been a huge national loss.
16 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Update and revise the training curricula by:
- Undergraduate: 1) adding a new undergraduate course on climate change and coastal 
adaptation; 2) revising two existing undergraduate courses;29 3) ensuring each DFAS 
undergraduate received a small research grant ($500) enabling them to participate in one of 
the five assessments FCMCBSP funded under KRA 2.1 and collaborate with their professors 
on presentations, poster presentations, and research abstracts; and 4) pilot testing and 
scaling up the J-term exchange program of promising undergraduates with the University of 
Rhode Island (URI) (Annex V, Tables 37 and 40; Annex VI).
- Graduate: 1) adding the program’s first graduate course on climate change and coastal 
adaptation; 2) facilitating the technical updating and modularization of three of the 
department’s most important graduate programs (e.g. majors) in collaboration with the 
Word Bank’s Africa Centre of Excellence in Coastal Resistance (ACECoR) project;
30 3) 
supporting the initial design of UCC’s first dual-degree program with URI; 4) facilitating a 
massive increase in the number of graduate students from six in FY 2014 to 40 in FY 2020; 
and 5) fueling a massive increase in research by the faculty and students since they received 
support for field work as part of their partial and full scholarship support (Annex V, Tables 
37 and 38; Annex VI).
This assistance galvanized a massive transformation remarked on by all UCC participants in the FGDs
and KIIs (Annex IV. Tables C.1.1-C.1.2). Eighty-eight (88) percent of the 16 DFAS faculty who 
responded to the online questionnaire stated they agreed or strongly agreed that the organizational and 
human capacity of DFAS/CCM has been strengthened as a result of the improved infrastructure and 
capacity-building (Annex IV, Table 22). Ninety-five (95)-100 percent of the FCMCBSP PMB and staff who 
responded to the online questionnaire stated FCMCBSP activities increased: 1) grantsmanship and donor 
funding; 2) student enrollment; 3) the quality of the students enrolled; 4) student participation in other 
institutional activities; and 5) the quality and scope of research and the quality and quantity of publication 
(Annex IV, Table 17). Four of the best indicators of this successful capacity-building are: 1) the DFAS 
laboratory is widely regarded as the most state-of-the-art laboratory in the country and attracts work 
from major national research institutions and other universities (Annex V, Table 35); 2) the project’s 
substantial over-achievement (860 percent) of its original target for “scientific studies published or 
conference presentations given” (Annex III, Indicator 19); 3) the increased prominence of senior DFAS 
faculty on international boards (Text Box 2); and 4) DFAS’s state-of-the-art laboratory and growing 
reputation for quality training were critical in attracting new grants like ACECoR (Annex V, Table 51).31
29 The National Accreditation Board requires all programs be revised every five years. Because of this, some courses have to be 
revised to meet new trends. 
30 Three existing postgraduate programs in DFAS were revised into modules to accommodate new concepts as well as to meet 
the requirements of ACECoR. Although most direct costs of the modularization process (e.g. workshop) were funded by 
ACECoR, the facilities and faculty networks (at UCC and the other four Ghanaian universities) that facilitated these revisions 
were developed under FCMCBSP.
31 FGDs and review of some of the proposals and reports on these other grants. January 2020.
17 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Text Box 2. Increased Prominence of DFSA Faculty on International Boards
In the last five years, CCM Director, FCMCBSP Project Manager, and DFAS Professor Denis W. Aheto has 
increased the number of national and international boards related to fisheries and coastal resource management 
that he serves on from zero to seven.
DFAS Chair and FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator Noble Asare has increased his membership on key national 
boards from zero to three. 
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation. January 2020.
Four of the most frequently discussed challenges DFAS is likely to face in consolidating this successful 
capacity-building over the next year are: 1) accelerating the procurement of processes needed to 
complete the International Standards Organization (ISO) certification of the DFAS laboratory and a 
business plan for the laboratory; 2) securing additional funding for the initial pilot test of the URI-UCC
dual-degree program;32 3) finding ways to mitigate the sharp increase in the faculty-student ratio and 
teaching load of the professors that has accompanied the dramatic increase in graduate enrollment due 
to FCMCBSP scholarships and the other donor programs FCMCBSP’s success has attracted (Annex V, 
Table 39);
33 and 4) facilitating the 34 FCMCBSP students due to graduate by August 2020 translating this 
capacity-building into actual employment, which was an important sub-objective of the project and is 
currently only 31 percent of the original life of project target (Annex III, Indicator 21; Annex V, Table 
41).
34
CCM: Although CCM was officially approved by the UCC Academic Board in December 2013, it was 
not fully operationalized until FCMCBSP started in FY 2015 (Annex VII). With FCMCBSP support, CCM:
• Developed its current system of Board governance and strategic planning.
• Built its internal capacity to develop grant proposals and manage, monitor, and report on large 
grants.
• Built the capacity of UCC’s top administration (through exchange visits, one-on-one trainings,
and mentorships) to support large donor-funded grants like FCMCBSP.
• Developed stronger professional linkages to MoFAD, the NGO sector, its four sister university 
fisheries programs in Ghana, and the private sector.
• Developed linkages and interactions with international centers of excellence.
32 Although ACECoR is providing partial support for the first group of DFAS students scheduled to pilot-test the program in 
the 2020-2021 academic year, this support will not cover all of the costs.
33 One innovative way DFAS mitigated the impact of this issue was by facilitating senior professors at other Ghanaian and non￾Ghanaian universities to serve on the student committees since FY 2015 (Annex V, Table 54). Many of these professors also 
served as consultants and/or were involved (through their students) in the five FCMCBSP-sponsored assessments under KRA 
2.1 (Annex V, Table 49). 
34 At the time of the evaluation, only 11 of the 34 graduate students were on track to accept jobs, and three of these 11 were 
working in temporary positions. While it is possible a few of the best students will be hired for one or two of the post-doctoral 
positions created by ACECoR—which can pave the way to their eventually being hired as university faculty—this type of 
academic employment at UCC’s DFAS and its four sister departments at other universities can absorb only a limited portion of 
students being trained. To date, neither DFAS nor CCM has the resources or time to develop a solid platform for helping 
students conduct job searches, access post-doctoral opportunities in Ghana or abroad, or develop the entrepreneurship skills 
needed to start or join consulting or advocacy businesses or NGOs. Until this is done, the quantity and quality of the students 
coming into DFAS will be scholarship driven. In 2019, when no scholarships were available, DFAS had only one M.Phil. 
application. In 2020, when CCM was able to advertise 45 scholarship positions (30 M.Phil. and 15 Ph.D.) the department had 
over 700 applications (FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation FGDs with faculty and students; verified with the FCMCBSP 
Project Manager and M&E Support.)
18 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Identified the need for, pilot tested, and scaled up a series of platforms for the successful 
outreach and extension needed to affect policy and capacity-building in the fisheries sector 
never before tried in Ghana or West Africa, including: 
- Short-term trainings: Developing, pilot testing, and scaling up a new model for high￾quality, evidence-based short-term trainings in four areas critical to building the capacity of 
the government and private sector to promote sustainable fisheries and coastal management 
(Annex V, Table 46).
- National stakeholder conferences: Successfully organizing Ghana’s first two national 
stakeholder conferences on fisheries and coastal environment, as well as a series of 
workshops on key policy issues (Annex V, Tables 47 and 48).
- FishCoMGhana: Pilot testing and scaling up a new model for an online database that 
provides frontline actors in the government and private sector with direct access to high￾quality, evidence-based research on Ghana’s fisheries and coastal management sector 
(Annex V, Tables 43, 44, and 45).
- National program for undergraduate research fellowships: Pilot testing a new 
concept of providing research grants to undergraduate students in fisheries departments 
throughout Ghana, which is helping build the national profile of the discipline and its issues 
at the national level (Annex V, Table 40).
- A national journal and professional association: Helping DFAS create Ghana’s first 
national journal and professional association for the fisheries and coastal management 
sector—the Fisheries and Aquaculture Society of Ghana (FASoG) and the Journal of 
Fisheries and Coastal Management (JFCoM) (Annex V, Table 52).
Five years later, CCM is fully operational with two permanent research assistants and six temporary 
research assistants funded under FCMCBSP, which UCC plans to convert to permanent staff positions 
by May 1, 2020.35 One of the most visible indicators of this increased organizational and human capacity 
has been the increase in the number of CCM partners from two in FY 2019 (USAID and URI) to six
major partners—USAID, Danish International Development Agency [DANIDA], the World Bank, URI, 
Germany, and Norway—and four minor partners—the National Geographic Foundation, the French 
Embassy, Australian Aid, and the World Academy of Science (Annex V, Table 51). A second indicator is 
CCM’s high score on the Africa Lead Organizational Capacity Assessment.36 It is clear from the feedback 
the evaluators received from the FGD with senior UCC administration and CCM Board that the chief 
challenge CCM faces at this stage in its development is to avoid becoming “a victim of its own success,”
37
i.e. adjusting its financial and staff management structure to accommodate this rapid scale up in activities 
accompanying all of the new donor-funded activities attracted by FCMCBSP’s success.
UCC: There was widespread agreement among most stakeholders that due to FCMCBSP’s start-up 
investment—and early success in helping CCM and DFAS attract additional grants—UCC is now widely 
recognized as being the lead university-based center for fisheries and coastal management in Ghana and 
an emerging regional West African center for excellence as witnessed by its January 2019 receipt of the 
ACECoR project.
38 Eighty-six (86) percent of the 70 government officials who responded to the online 
35 Prior to the VC’s announcement that UCC would fund these positions, there was real concern. Only 57 percent of 
FCMCBSP staff felt CCM had adequate staff to continue to support its activities (Annex IV, Table 17).
36 By the third year of the project, CCM was already highly functional, as testified to by its score of 80 percent on the Africa 
Lead Organizational Capacity Assessment at the end of FY 2016. This capacity was reassessed just after the final performance 
evaluation field visits at 93 percent (Annex III, Indicator 16). (John Nene-Osom Azu and Isadore Nii Attoh Armah. 2020. 
USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. End of Project Organizational Capacity 
Assessment. Cape Coast: Proven Ag. Solutions. March 2020).
37 This phrase was used repeatedly during FGDs with the FCMCBSP PMB and Project Manager.
38 Ninety-six (96) percent of UCC faculty who were not FCMCBSP staff members or members of the PMB agreed the 
improved infrastructure and capacity-building facilitated by FCMCBSP strengthened UCC as a whole (Annex IV, Table 22).
19 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
questionnaire agreed FCMCBSP’s capacity-building activities had achieved one of their important sub￾objectives, to strengthen the Ministries’ working relationship with the fisheries and coastal management 
experts at UCC (Annex IV, Table 19).
EQ 1.B: Have efforts to increase marine and coastal resource and resource assessments 
(KRA 2.1) and improved communication, extension and outreach (KRA 2.2) resulted in 
increased information and knowledge for natural resource management? 
Increased marine and coastal research and resource assessments (KRA 2.1): When 
FCMCBSP was designed, it anticipated conducting five marine and coastal research and resource 
assessments in five areas MoFAD identified as critical to the fishing industry (Activity 2.1.1-2.1.5) and the 
development of an online database (Activity 2.1.6) to ensure the results were easily available to other 
national and international researchers as well as “to government and other stakeholders on matters relating 
to biodiversity conservation and sustainable fisheries production.”39 The evaluators based their assessment of 
EQ 1.b. on: 1) their review of the technical quality, results, dissemination strategy existing or projected 
policy impact of the studies by the evaluation team’s Technical Advisor Evans Arizi (Annex VI); and 2) 
the stakeholders’ rankings of the perceived utility and existing and projected policy importance of the 
studies in the online questionnaires and FGDs/KIIs. 
The technical review confirmed project reports and feedback the team received through FGDs and KIIs, 
which indicate the five assessments were conducted with a high degree of scientific rigor that included:
• The involvement of three consultant teams from other universities recruited through a rigorous 
competitive process.
• Research support from 36 graduate and 80 undergraduate students from UCC and 72 
undergraduates from other universities.
• High levels of supervision and quality oversight from the UCC faculty member in charge of each 
of the five studies, as well as the students’ academic advisors (Annex VI). To ensure quality 
control, CCM required: 1) all graduates and undergraduates to be co-supervised by the UCC 
faculty member in charge of each of the five assessments as well as their academic advisor;40 and 
2) a DFAS-implemented mandatory weekly seminar during which students attached to each 
study reported on its interim results.
The technical review provided clear evidence (Table 2):
• The five assessments provided policy-significant results that informed or are likely to inform 
GoG’s commercial fisheries policies; and
• The principal vehicle for sharing this information with policy makers and other researchers has 
been the FCMCBSP-facilitated FishCoMGhana database and two national policy conferences.
39 UCC. 2014. Detailed Program Description: Provision of Technical and Financial Support at the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences, University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: DFAS for USAID/Ghana. July 2014 . Pg. 14.
40 For a full list of students, advisors, and all of the reports, dissertations, and theses related to the study, see Annex VI.
20 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 2. Summary of Research Results of the FCMCBSP-funded Assessments, How the Results 
Were Shared, and Current Projected Significance for Policy and NRM 
Study
# of Major 
Research 
Results and 
Location in 
Annex VI
Shared 
on the 
Web41
Shared at 
National 
Policy
Conferences
Shared at 
Regional and 
Community
Debriefings
Shared 
in the 
Journal
Current or 
Projected 
Significance 
for Policy 
and NRM
1. Fishery stock 
assessment
5 
(Section 2.4)
Yes Yes No Current42
2. Research and
assessment of 
marine fisheries 
governance 
issues
10 
(Section 3.4)
Yes Yes 1 regional,
23 community 
debriefings
No Current43
3. Research on 
fish and shellfish 
of commercial 
value
7 tilapia and 
catfish, 4 oyster 
production, and 1 
clam production 
(Section 4.3)
Yes Yes No Current44
4. Analysis of 
value chains of 
fish trade
-Croaker fish 
value chain
5 
(Section 5.3.1)
No Yes No Projected45
-Fish 
transport and 
conservation
5 
(Section 5.3.2)
No Yes No Projected46
5. Monitoring
biodiversity of 
coastal 
ecosystems
19 
(Section 6.3)
Yes Yes Yes (2 
articles)
Current47
Source: Annex VI.
Due to the DFAS-implemented mandatory weekly seminars, all UCC stakeholders (DFAS faculty, CCM 
staff, and graduate and undergraduate students) reported being familiar with the research methodologies 
and results of the major studies. Most other FCMCBSP stakeholder groups (NGOs; producer 
41 Ghanalinks.com and FishCoMGhana.org.
42 The studies contributed important scientific information to the existing base of knowledge on the biology and population 
dynamics of some of the commercially important fish stocks in Ghana’s marine waters. The same studies provided data that 
helped strengthen the government’s resolve (and the private sector’s willingness to accept) regular closed fishing seasons in 
order to reverse the declining trend of fish landings (Annex VI, Section 2.6).
43 The findings contributed useful evidence on the need to strengthen fisheries management outcomes and place moratoriums 
on fishing activities in Ghana’s marine waters during certain parts of the year to facilitate recovery of the marine fisheries of 
Ghana (Annex VI, Section 3.6).
44 The results provide vital scientific information on how the West African mangrove oyster and black chin tilapia can be 
cultured on a large scale to enhance the aquaculture industry in Ghana. The findings have significant potential impacts on 
supplementary livelihoods in fishing communities, especially during lean or closed fishing seasons. (Annex VI, Section 4.5).
45 This series of studies has significant potential for supporting the management of highly valued demersal fish stocks such as the 
croakers in Ghana.
46 This series of studies has significant potential for supporting the management of highly valued demersal fish stocks such as the 
croakers in Ghana.
47 The study contributes critical data to support GoG’s recommendations that local communities stop using coastal water 
bodies as refuse dumping sites and highlight the need for GoG to create more stringent by-laws for conservation of coastal 
water bodies. (Annex VI. Section 6.5). These studies also provide baseline information needed to monitor various ecosystems 
in the face of ongoing and projected offshore oil and gas exploration and production in Ghana (Annex VI, Section 6.3). 
21 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
organizations; MoFAD staff at national, regional, and local levels; and the national staff in the partner 
USAID projects SFMP and CSLP) were less familiar with the study results in large part because most of 
them never had any formal instruction on how to use FishCoMGhana.48
Two of the most important examples of where this information had a direct and measurable impact on 
important policy decisions were (Annex VI): 1) banning illegal fishing (known locally as saiko or bad fish) 
by industrial trawlers; and 2) enforcing the country’s first successful one-month closed season in FY 
2019.
The chief criticism of the five assessments is despite their scientific rigor, only two articles had been 
published in a refereed academic journal (FCMCBSP’s JFCoM) by the time of the final evaluation. This—
in the eyes of the PMB, DFAS faculty, and CCM staff interviewed in the FGDs, as well as the Evaluation 
Technical Advisor—is a tremendous missed opportunity that needs to be addressed in the next two 
years.49 Since the majority of the graduate students are women, and publishing these articles is essential 
to them getting hired by UCC and other Ghanaian universities, this activity is critical to FCMCBSP 
achieving an increase in the number of female leaders in tenured leadership positions in the country’s 
leading research and teaching institution working on fisheries and coastal resources management.50
Communication, extension, and outreach strengthened (KRA 2.2): Most stakeholder groups 
agreed or strongly agreed the creation and execution of these FCMCBSP communication, extension, 
and outreach platforms had “strengthened the communication of extension and outreach of evidence-based 
research on marine and coastal management.” There was, however, significant variation between the 
stakeholder groups in terms of which platform they considered to be most effective in building their 
personal capacity and skills (Annex IV, Tables 11 and 12).
Short-term trainings: A major achievement of the project—which was consistently ranked as one of 
the most effective activities in the FGDs and online questionnaires—was the development of training 
modules in four areas DFAS and CCM identified as top priorities of the Fisheries Commission and other 
key stakeholder actors. 51
Media trainings and communication strategies: Another highly ranked activity was the project’s 
communication strategy, which: 1) supported the costs of many journalists attending the two national 
conferences; 2) provided a media room with computers and good internet connection at each 
conference to help the journalists file their stories; 3) supported the costs of one radio company (ATL 
FM) providing live coverage at the national conferences; 4) facilitated (with per-diem) qualified journalists 
participating in one of the project’s mainstream short-term trainings (Activities 2.2.1.-2.2.4) as well as
two specialist journalist trainings;52 and 5) backstopped journalists creating their own WhatsApp group 
(Coast to Coast), which connected them to one another and FCMCBSP.53
48 FGDs with MoFAD staff. January 2020.
49 To date, only two articles have been published in refereed journals using the results of the five research assessment projects, 
and there is a huge backlog of unanalyzed data, only part of which is likely to be presented in the student theses (Annex VI).
50 At the time of the evaluation, there was only one tenured female professor in the five fisheries and coastal resources 
departments of the five universities where the evaluation team interviewed.
51 These areas were: 1) integrated coastal management; 2) fisheries management; 3) climate change adaptation and mitigation; 
and 4) a basic and advanced Geographic Information System (GIS) course (Annex V, Tables 46 and 47). Sixty-four (64) of the 70 
(91 percent) government respondents to the online questionnaire ranked the short-term trainings as the most effective 
FCMCBSP activity (Annex IV, Table 20).
52 Project records show 70 journalists from 21 outlets have been trained in one of the project’s two journalist trainings and/or
mainstream short-term trainings. Some journalists attended multiple events; some only one.
53 One hundred (100) percent of the 17 media specialists responding to the online questionnaire agreed FCMCBSP’s four￾pronged media strategy (training, networking, UCC backup, Coast to Coast) resulted in increased sharing of information and 
22 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Two national policy conferences: The two FCMCBSP-supported national policy conferences, which 
were attended by 274 people in 2017 and 262 people in 2019 from all the major stakeholder groups,
were consistently ranked by all stakeholders as the most effective outreach activities and one most 
stakeholders strongly agreed had “built the capacity of the staff and members of your organization” (Annex 
IV, Table 11).54 The genius of the FCMCBSP policy conference model was it created a user-friendly 
(a.k.a. government-sponsored) forum for all principal stakeholders in the sector to discuss evidence￾based research and its public policy implications. 
The Journal and Society: Based on enthusiastic feedback from the first FCMCBSP-sponsored policy 
conference in 2017, a group of faculty from the five major Ghanaian universities announced their 
intention to fast-forward the creation of the country’s first national Journal and Society focused on 
fisheries and costal issues to strengthen the exchange of policy-relevant research among key national 
actors and principal international actors such as the World Bank, African Union, and European and U.S.-
based universities.55 Although All UCC stakeholders strongly agreed JFCoM and FASoG were “effective 
methods of information sharing,”56 only a small number of the stakeholders had actually joined FASoG
and/or read or contributed to JFCoM. Two groups with the highest levels of FASoG membership were 
UCC (22 percent) and the media (40 percent) (Annex IV, Tables 21, 24, 28, and 31).
Social media and websites: Most stakeholder FGDs ranked the DFAS Facebook page (which had 1,141 
likes in January 2020) as important (Annex IV, Tables 11 and 12), and noted the CCM website is an 
important window to the project any outsider could go to for information about its activities or to apply 
for a short-term training or conference. Respondents agreed future programs should make it easier to 
find online application materials for the conferences and short-term trainings.
Based on feedback from the FGDs and online questionnaires, it appears each of these platforms, 
targeting different stakeholders, is expected to be continued and scaled up after FCMCBSP ends. The 
chief criticism of the platforms in the KIIs and FGDs was, while it was easy to track the impact of the 
trainings on personal capacity of the staff who participated in FCMCBSP-sponsored trainings, 
workshops, and conferences, it was not always clear if and how this training contributed to the 
organizational capacity of the institution as a whole since there was often little FCMCBSP follow-up to 
facilitate the training being cascaded to other people in the organization. This accounts for most non￾UCC respondents to the online questionnaires ranking the impact of the project on their personal 
capacity much higher than the impact on their institution. 57
EQ 1.C: Has the implementation of community-based activities resulted in increased 
opportunities for improved natural resource management and/or income-generation 
activities amongst the rural families, and has it impacted the target communities?
In addition to its communication and outreach activities, FCMCBSP pilot tested two different models for 
building UCC’s capacity to backstop community-based extension for coastal management and fisheries 
initiatives. The first focused on engaging school clubs in four communities for joint monitoring of the 
knowledge for NRM to the public in Ghana, and 94 percent agreed it increased the quality of their media outlet’s reporting and 
the number of stories they produced on related topics (Annex IV, Tables 29, 30, and 31). 
54 All 65 respondents to the online questionnaires in stakeholder groups 1, 2, 3.A, 5.B, and 6 who attended either or both 
conferences stated they agreed the biannual conference gave participants a forum to share knowledge and concerns; 88 percent 
stated the conference encouraged the government to implement policies that promote sustainable fisheries and coastal 
management; and 98 percent agreed the conference increased information and knowledge for NRM (Annex IV, Table 16).
55 Since their co-founding in 2018, FASoG has held two meetings and JFCoM has published one issue (Annex V, Tables 52 and 
53).
56 One hundred twenty-three (123) of the 140 online questionnaire respondents in stakeholder groups 1,2,3.A., 5.B, and 6 
agreed JFCoM contributes important information and knowledge for NRM (Annex IV, Table 16).
57 The average rankings for individual impact were consistently higher across all stakeholder groups. The one exception to this 
was UCC faculty in DFAS (Annex IV, Table 24)
23 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ecological health of the communities’ wetlands (with UCC researchers and two NGOs working in the 
sector, Hen Mpoano and Friends of the Nation). The second focused on capacity strengthening for 
governance and livelihoods security in eight coastal communities (later reduced to four). The evaluators 
based their assessment on answering two questions: 1) have these activities built the capacity of the 
local CBOs (schools, CBFMGs) and partner NGOs (Hen Mpoano and Friends of the Nation) to improve 
their advocacy, their ability to seek answers, and engage positively with local authorities in the 
governance of fisheries and coastal resources; and 2) have these activities enabled the CBOs and partner 
NGOs to become a conduit for communicating and extending important information to local 
communities. 
To collect the data needed to answer these questions the evaluation team conducted: 1) community￾based interviews with multiple groups of actors at four sites; as well as 2) FGDs and KIIs with the 
consultants and NGO staff who supported these programs.
The wetlands ecological and health monitoring using school clubs and communities 
(Activities 2.27-2.28): Based on multiple FGDs at two of the four sites where the FCMCBSP model of 
promoting wetlands ecological monitoring through schools was tested, the evaluators concluded the 
activity: 1) was a very effective conduit for communicating and extending important information to local 
communities; and 2) contributed (directly and indirectly) to the development of new, more wetland￾friendly income-generating activities (IGAs) for the local people and attracted other donor-funded 
projects and GoG resources to help communities support the scale up of these new, less-destructive 
IGAs.
Promoting supplementary livelihoods in coastal communities (Activity 2.2.9): In contrast to 
the wetlands monitoring program, the FCMCBSP livelihoods activities were plagued with difficulties 
from the start. To date, none of the four communities developed a profitable IGA from the pilots, which 
were terminated in the third year due to lack of funding. The same contracting mechanism made it 
difficult to ascertain what, if any, benefits accrued to the local communities through the project’s 
investment in capacity strengthening of the eight original groups in the first and second year. Based on 
project records, it does not appear there is any direct or indirect evidence the livelihood activities had a 
lasting impact on the communities’ capacity to advocate or engage positively with local authorities in the 
governance of fisheries and coastal communities. The chief exception to this was Anlo Beach, where 
stakeholders argued frequent visits to their community by UCC and junior high students, journalists, and 
staff—most of which were unrelated to FCMCBSP’s livelihood activities support—gave them courage to 
lobby local authorities for help on relocation and developing new activities. All of these problems, which 
were verified in two field visits, are clearly spelled out in FCMCBSP’s internal final assessment of the 
livelihood activities.58
Impact of FCMCBSP on the two executing NGOs: All NGO staff interviewed in FGDs strongly 
agreed or agreed their organizational and human capacity had been strengthened as a result of their 
collaboration with FCMCBSP (Annex IV, Table 11). They reported this impact was the result of their: 1) 
collaboration with the project on the design and execution of the wetlands ecological health monitoring 
pilot program (Activity 2.2.7); 2) participation in the FCMCBSP research study designed to monitor the 
NRM impact of that pilot program (Activity 2.1.5); and 3) participation in the FCMCBSP-sponsored 
short-term trainings and conferences. For Hen Mpoano, this capacity-building was strengthened because 
it was also a partner of the USAID-sponsored SFMP, which gave it access to additional funds and 
support that complemented FCMCBSP’s investments and encouraged a more broad-based participation 
of its staff in FCMCBSP communication extension and outreach activities. 
58 Joshua Adotey. 2019. USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Internal Evaluation 
of Activity 2.2.9. Promoting Supplementary Livelihoods in Coastal Communities. Cape Coast: CCM. (September 2019).
24 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Key Factors That Effected Project Efficiency, Efficacy, and Results: The eight most frequently 
noted factors project staff felt had a negative impact on the project’s achievement of its intended goal 
and objectives as defined by the results framework were:59
• The contract language for the government-to-government (G2G) grant, which did not allow for 
any direct institutional support to UCC through overhead nor for the project to buy back staff 
time, since this was considered counterpart funding.
• The original budget in the approved grant was made in dollars but the project was paid in cedis, 
so the actual amount of money dispersed to the project was less than originally budgeted since 
the project was often forced to purchase equipment in dollars, which required the reconversion 
of the cedis back to dollars. 
• UCC’s cumbersome procurement, accounting, and development office procedures were the 
source of major delays in getting equipment and starting many activities on time. 
• The UCC development office, which is charged with managing the physical refurbishment of 
offices and labs, had very little experience in managing grants activities and created a host of 
bottlenecks executing grants.
• The high rates of turnover in the university accountant positions (four times over the life of the 
project) necessitated constant retraining.
• A one-year delay in the receipt of project funds from USAID in early 2017 (FY 2016), which 
caused many FCMCBSP activities to be eliminated or delayed.
• The national hiring freeze on government employment, which delayed the process needed to 
transform the FCMCBSP temporary staff positions into permanent CCM positions.
• Project leaders did not understand the importance of having a well thought out M&E and 
communication strategy from the start or how this could complicate (and undervalue) the 
project’s ability to track its impact and results.
Five of the most frequently cited factors facilitating the project’s effectiveness, efficiency, and results 
were:
• The project’s strong committed leadership from its Manager, M&E Coordinator, and Board.
• The well-trained project staff.
• The project’s strong collaboration with URI, which was nurtured through two other USAID￾funded projects (ICFG and SFMP), helped create and maintain a series of synergistic 
relationships that increased the effectiveness, efficiency, and impact of all three projects.
• USAID/Ghana’s willingness for the project to pilot test a large number of innovative new sub￾activities and platforms not in the original proposals.
• The active support of UCC administration, which included: 1) transforming the position of the 
CCM Coordinator into a directorship; 2) providing in-kind support for electricity, water, and 
space; 3) providing the salaries for all of the professors and the two senior laboratory managers; 
4) agreeing to create and fund two permanent research fellow positions for CCM; 5) providing a 
$100,000 no-interest loan facility to the project in FY 2016 when USAID/Ghana experienced a 
delay in receiving its funding from Washington; and 6) agreeing to convert the six temporary 
staff positions in CCM (which were scheduled to end March 30, 2020)60 into permanent 
research fellow positions (despite a nation-wide hiring freeze) starting May 1, 2020.61
59 FGDs and online questionnaire responses (Annex IV, Table 17, Questions 14, 15, 20, and 22).
60 These are currently classified as research assistants.
61 The VC’s verbal commitment to the FCMCBSP Project Manager was reiterated to the evaluators during their exit interview. 
25 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
4.1.2. CONCLUSIONS 
EQ 1.A: FCMCBSP support for infrastructure (like improved laboratories and equipment) helped 
strengthened the organizational and human capacity of DFAS in ways that are attracting additional 
human and infrastructural investment to DFAS, CCM, and UCC at large. FCMCBSP also increased the 
technical and scientific capacity of UCC in ways that have attracted the international and internal 
support it needs to sustain and scale up this success. 
Although FCMCBSP has not completed sustainability plans for most of its activities, there is a strong 
commitment by staff to maintaining and scaling up most of the activities and platforms created—even 
those not being supported by ACECoR—now that the UCC VC has assured CCM the six FCMCBSP 
staff positions will become permanent. Three cross-cutting challenges the project will need to confront 
in conjunction with its phase-out planning include:
• Challenge #1: Developing a draft one-year transition action plan for CCM management 
capable of managing the massive increase in activities accompanying the new projects FCMCBSP 
attracted.
• Challenge #2: Accelerating the procurement processes needed to complete the installation of 
the laboratory and ISO certification.
• Challenge #3: Addressing four outstanding issues needed to consolidate FCMCBSP’s results: 
- Challenge #3.A. Fully funding the initial pilot test of the URI-UCC dual-degree program.
- Challenge #3.B. Increasing publication on the five FCMCBSP research projects.
- Challenge #3.C. Assisting the 34 FCMCBSP students finding the types of permanent 
employment in the sector expected from the FCMCBSP-funded scholarships.
- Challenge #3.D. Mitigating the impact of the sharp increase in the faculty-student ratio on 
training and research quality.
EQ 1.B: FCMCBSP’s support for the five research assessments led by some of Ghana’s leading fisheries
experts dramatically increased the supply of high-quality information and knowledge on Ghana’s most 
pressing fisheries and coastal management issues. To date, however, there is a huge backlog in the 
analysis and write up of the information collected by the consultants, graduate students, and 
undergraduate students who worked on these assessments. There is also no solid plan for deciding if 
and how these studies (and databases) will be used to inform and monitor future policies for fisheries 
and coastal management.
FCMCBSP also developed a series of communication and extension platforms (FishCoMGhana, short￾term trainings, national conferences, JFCoM and FASoG, social media sites, and media capacity-building 
and support) that are increasing the principal stakeholders’ in the fisheries sector’s access to information 
and knowledge about NRM, as well as its use in policy discussions and decisions. Despite the project’s 
innovative use of these mechanisms to target different stakeholder groups, it was very hard to show the 
wider institutional impact of this increased information on most of the project’s principal government 
and non-government partners since this information was not being tracked by the FCMCBSP M&E 
system.
EQ 1.C: The unsuccessful execution of FCMCBSP’s support for livelihood activities using a series of 
short-term consultant contracts backstopped by technical experts from UCC and other sources 
highlights the need for CCM to develop an alternative model to achieve its official mandate for 
community-level outreach and extension.
FCMCBSP’s successful co-execution of a new model for promoting ecological monitoring of wetlands 
with two junior high schools: 1) is an example of best practice that should be scaled up as an afterschool 
activity through the national education system to other coastal communities; and 2) highlights the critical 
26 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
importance of DFAS and CCM strengthening their future collaboration with NGOs for grassroots 
community capacity-building and extension to promote more sustainable fisheries and coastal resource 
management.
4.1.3. RECOMMENDATIONS 
Short-term Closeout 
The most immediate short-term challenge the project faces is determining how it will reconfigure the 
old FCMCBSP staff positions and management model into a new model that can manage its 
responsibilities under ACECoR, as well as those not supported by the new project. 
Recommendation 1.1.62 Closeout planning processes: Expand the focus of FCMCBSP’s closeout 
processes to include two outside facilitators, one appointed by the UCC VC as his personal 
representative and one from outside UCC.
• Recommendation 1.1.a. New staffing and management plan: Identify and define the 
position descriptions of the ten most critical CCM staff identified for the next phase, including: 
1) general administration/office management; 2) M&E; 3) extension and communication; 4) 
partner coordination; 5) online data resources; 6) gender; 7) health, safety, and risk 
management; 8) trainings, workshops, and conferences; 9) donor coordination; and 10) 
research.
• Recommendation 1.1.b. Bridge transition year strategic plan: Develop a draft program 
plan for all activities and funded projects during this transition year identifying how the project 
plans to address key issues identified in the final evaluation (i.e., the first year FCMCBSP ends 
[April 30, 2020-March 30, 2021]).
• Recommendation 1.1.c. Administrative procedure review and action plan: 
- Recommendation 1.1.c.i. Rules and regulations: Review principal lessons learned 
from FCMCBSP regarding UCC rules and regulations concerning procurement, accounting, 
and the development office.
- Recommendation 1.1.c.ii. Procedures: Develop a joint action plan to pilot test new 
ways of streamlining these procedures.
- Recommendation 1.1.c.iii. Visits and assistance: Facilitate this process by promoting 
exchange visits and technical assistance.
Recommendation 1.2. DFAS laboratory:
• Recommendation 1.2.a. ISO accreditation and manual: Ensure the DFAS consultant 
charged with completing the ISO accreditation and developing a laboratory user and safety 
manual finishes before FCMCBSP closes.
• Recommendation 1.2.b. Equipment procurement: Speed up procurement to get the 
missing parts the DFAS consultant needs to get the Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS) and 
Gas Chromatography (GC) equipment in the laboratory fully installed before FCMCBSP closes.
62 The recommendations are numbered as follows:
• All recommendations in the 1.x sequence are for closeout/transition activities (March 2020);
• All recommendations in the 2.x sequence are for most pressing bridge-funding institutional issues for the coming year 
(April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021); and
• All recommendations in the 3.x sequence are for important bridge institutional activities for the coming year (April 1, 
2020-March 30, 2021).
27 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Most pressing bridge-funding institutional issues for the coming year (April 1, 2020-March 
30, 2021)
Four areas were identified where there is a pressing need for additional USAID support to complete 
certain activities critical to building the new institutional framework DFAS and CCM need to link the 
FCMCBSP achievements to their new, more expanded donor portfolio.
Recommendation 2.1. UCC-URI dual-degree program: (slated to start August 2020) Consider 
providing the complementary support DFAS needs to assist the ten Ph.D. students scheduled to start 
the dual-degree program in August 2020 to buy UCC-URI extra time to tap other donors and internal 
resources for future funding.
Recommendation 2.2. DFAS writing workshops: Consider supplementing support for and scaling 
up of the writing workshop UCC is already planning to encourage the consultants and graduate students 
who participated in the studies—as well as any faculty who backstopped them in the past or is willing to 
in the future—to complete drafts and submit them to refereed journals for publication. Since the 
majority of the graduate students are women and publishing these articles is essential to them getting 
hired by UCC and the other Ghanaian universities, this activity will strengthen FCMCBSP’s long-term 
gender impact.
Recommendation 2.3. CCM and DFAS job fair support: Consider assisting DFAS and CCM to 
develop better models for helping their graduate students get jobs and/or the post-doctoral 
opportunities or internships likely to lead to jobs. This is an activity that could be managed by a retired 
professor from UCC or another university who is well known to prospective employers. This professor 
could: 1) conduct a quick-start employment and networking opportunities analysis for the fisheries and 
coastal management sector in Ghana; 2) use this information to develop a series of virtual and in-person 
job fair presentations by prospective public-sector employers or agencies offering post-docs; and 3) 
coach FCMCBSP-funded graduates to become more entrepreneurial and consistent in their job searches 
and interviewing skills. If this pilot is successful in getting students jobs over the next year, CCM and 
DFAS could consider institutionalizing this type of career counseling into mainstream DFAS programs.
Recommendation 2.4. DFAS senior fellows program: Help DFAS pilot test two options for 
reducing the steep faculty-student ratio that is one of the negative unintended consequences of the 
sharp increase in graduate student funding since FY 2015 (Annex V, Table 39). These options include:
• Recommendation 2.4.a. Sabbaticals: Pilot test a senior fellows program at DFAS and CCM 
to provide top ups for senior faculty from other Ghanaian and regional universities to 
supplement their sabbatical pay in return for agreeing to mentor, supervise, chair, and/or co￾chair student thesis committees, and possibly even teach some critical courses.
• Recommendation 2.4.b. Fulbright fellows: Ask USAID to fast-forward a UCC request for 
two Fulbright teaching positions in DFAS for the 2020-21 academic year that could possibly be 
renewed for the next five years.
Important bridge institutional activities for the coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021)
Although conditions for sustaining many of the platforms need to be ironed out over the next year, only 
one—CCM’s mandate for extension—needs to be completely rethought based on lessons learned from 
the FCMCBSP pilot tests.
Recommendation 3.1. New CCM extension programs (FY 2020-future):
28 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Recommendation 3.1.a. Community-based activities: Consider shifting the focus of 
CCM’s extension mandate away from direct execution of community-based activities toward 
backstopping successful NGO and government-led initiatives at the community level.
• Recommendation 3.1.b. Scale up opportunities: Consider examining ways its highly 
successful community-based wetlands monitoring program (which is linked to one of the DFAS￾supervised research programs) could be scaled up through another donor-funded project.
• Recommendation 3.1.c. Monitoring: Consider ways the M&E of CCM’s community-based 
activities could be strengthened by involving more UCC faculty and students from social science 
departments.
4.2. EVALATION QUESTION 2: WHAT UNINTENDED OUTCOMES HAVE 
THE USAID/UCC FCMCBSP’S CAPACITY STRENGTHENING 
ACTIVITIES ACHIEVED RELEVANT TO IMPROVING SUSTAINABLE 
MANAGEMENT OF GHANA’S MARINE AND COASTAL RESOURCES?
4.2.1. FINDINGS
The evaluators based their assessment on: 1) the different stakeholders’ responses to the online 
questionnaires, FGDs, and KIIs; 2) a review of the original approved project plan in order to verify the 
outcomes were indeed unintended.63 This comparative analysis showed although most of the 22 
activities envisioned for achieving the four project outputs (KRAs 1.1- 2.2, Text Box 1) were in the 
proposal, the means for achieving some of the most critical project results were not. Some key 
unexpected means or outcomes—which had a dramatic impact on the effectiveness and the efficacy of 
FCMCBSP—include: the national conferences, JFCoM, FASoG, undergraduate research fellowships, joint 
grooming of graduate students, dual-degree programs with URI, and the media training initiative (Table 
3). Many of these unexpected outcomes are helping institutionalize some of the most critical 
mechanisms FCMCBSP stakeholders reported they are using and are likely to continue to use to build 
and maintain their personal networks with other experts in the field. Three key factors the stakeholders 
interviewed in the FGDs and KIIs identified as increasing FCMCBSP’s willingness and ability to identify, 
pilot test, and scale up these positive unexpected outcomes were: 1) the faculty, staff, and 
administrators’ exchange visits to URI; 2) SFMP’s complementary financial support; and 3) 
USAID/Ghana’s flexibility with adjusting the budget and annual work plans (Table 3; Annex V, Table 34). 
63 UCC. 2014. Detailed Program Description: Provision of Technical and Financial Support at the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences, University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: DFAS for USAID/Ghana. July 2014. 
29 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 3. FCMCBSP’s Unexpected Outcomes and Their Link to Collaboration with USAID-funded 
SFMP and URI
Unexpected 
Outcomes Not 
in Original 
Proposal
Impact on 
Sustainable 
Networking
Collaboration 
with USAID￾funded SFMP 
and URI on 
Exchange 
Visits
Collaboration 
with USAID￾funded SFMP
and URI on 
Co-funding
Collaboration 
with USAID￾funded SFMP 
and URI on In￾kind Support
M&E System 
Tracked Key 
Outputs/ 
Outcomes of 
This Activity
Creation of the 
first biannual
national 
conference on 
fisheries and 
coastal 
environment
Yes Yes Yes Yes No64
Creation of 
Ghana’s JFCoM Yes Yes No65
Establishment of 
FASoG Yes No
Scale up of the 
undergraduate 
research grants 
to five Ghanaian 
university-based 
DFAS programs
Yes No66
Establishment of 
the first wet 
laboratory (to 
complement the 
DFAS laboratory 
the grant 
envisioned)
Yes No67
The Media 
training and 
Coast to Coast 
WhatsApp 
network68
Yes No
64 Although 100 percent of the 65 respondents to the online questionnaires who reported attending either/both biannual 
conferences stated the conferences gave participants a forum to share knowledge and concerns, and 98 percent stated the 
conferences increased information and knowledge for NRM, the M&E system never developed a system of follow-up tracking to 
see if and how this information was encouraging the government to implement policies that promoted sustainable fisheries and 
coastal management, or what types of additional support might be needed to ensure this (Annex IV, Table 16).
65 Although 88 percent of the 140 respondents to the online questionnaires identified JFCoM as an extremely useful mechanism 
for facilitating exchange between national and international partners, this impact is not being tracked, which also makes it 
difficult to determine what types of support these activities might need in order to scale them up (Annex IV, Table 16).
66 Efforts to retroactively collect information on how participation in the undergraduate program affected students’ decisions 
about careers and graduate study through a tracer study in preparation for the final evaluation were successful in reaching only 
20 of the former students because of students changing their contact information without telling the department (Annex V, 
Table 40). 
67 To date, no system has been set up to track the cost/benefits of FCMCBSP and other donor investment in laboratories that 
could be used to inform the development of a sustainable laboratory business plan.
68 Although several journalists forwarded articles they wrote to the project to be posted on the CCM website, this clearly 
represented only a tiny fraction of the actual articles produced. The lack of an efficient system for tracking this wider impact 
was a missed opportunity. Two unintended consequences of creating Coast to Coast were: 1) it made it easier for FCMCBSP 
to alert journalists to new communication platforms (e.g. FishCoMGhana, JFCoM, and FASoG); and 2) it strengthened CCM’s 
30 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Unexpected 
Outcomes Not 
in Original 
Proposal
Impact on 
Sustainable 
Networking
Collaboration 
with USAID￾funded SFMP 
and URI on 
Exchange 
Visits
Collaboration 
with USAID￾funded SFMP
and URI on 
Co-funding
Collaboration 
with USAID￾funded SFMP 
and URI on In￾kind Support
M&E System 
Tracked Key 
Outputs/ 
Outcomes of 
This Activity
Joint academic 
programs with 
URI:
- J-term
- Co-grooming 
one-month 
exchange 
programs
- Dual-degree 
program
Yes Yes Yes Yes No69
Source: Annex V, Table 50; Annex VII; and personal communication with FCMCBSP Project Manager Denis
Aheto, and URI Senior Coastal Resources Manager Brian Crawford, February 26, 2020.
Unfortunately, due to the way the M&E system was set up and managed during the first three years, it is 
hard to determine the wider impact of some of these highly successful unexpected outcomes on either:
• PIR 1: The project’s impact on the organizational and human capacity of FCMCBSPs key 
university and non-university-based partners; or
• PIR 2: Increased information and knowledge for NRM.
4.2.2. CONCLUSIONS
FCMCBSP identified, pilot-tested, and scaled up a number of new platforms that strengthened its 
principal results and the networking between key-sector actors crucial to sustaining these results once 
project funding ends. Unfortunately, it is hard to track the wider impact of many of these activities 
because the M&E system did not: 1) keep very accurate records on any information except the required 
indicators in the PITT during the first three years; or 2) anticipate the need for a stakeholder database 
that would enable the project to track which individuals they had worked with in specific institutions.
awareness of emerging coastal management disasters (like major storms) in ways that allowed them to improve their response 
time. One vivid example was when a regionally based journalist alerted the group to how fierce storms in May-July 2017 were 
accelerating one community’s rate of coastal erosion. This event was then fully documented by a FCMCBSP drone within 24 
hours, helping to accelerate the government’s emergency team response.
69 Although the URI collaboration with UCC is widely regarded as an example of best practice, neither FCMCBSP nor the 
evaluation team was able to develop a system for tracking this collaboration or the cost/benefits accrued to each partner from 
the collaboration even though there were many. In conjunction with the final evaluation, the evaluators asked SFMP to develop
a table that described how its Intermediate Results (IRs) and activities were strengthened by their collaboration with FCMCBSP 
as a model for this type of tracking (Annex V, Table 50). 
31 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
4.2.3. RECOMMENDATIONS 
Important Bridge Institutional Activities for the Coming Year (April 1, 2020 - March 30, 
2021)
Recommendation 3.2. New CCM M&E Strategy (FY 2020-future):
• Recommendation 3.2.a. Full-time M&E officer: Future CCM-managed projects should 
anticipate the need for a qualified full-time M&E officer from the start, and make sure all staff 
and CCM M&E officers are trained in the M&E regulations of specific projects from the start.
• Recommendation 3.2.b. Internal indicators: If any new project activities are added that 
are not tracked by the indicators in the M&E plan, develop a set of internal indicators that can 
track both participation and impact.
4.3. EVALUATION QUESTION 3: TO WHAT EXTENT HAS USAID/UCC 
FCMCBSP COLLABORATED WITH OTHER USAID-FUNDED PROJECTS 
SUCH AS THE CSLP, SFMP, AND GOG PARTNERS, SUCH AS THE 
MOFAD, OTHER DONOR PROJECTS, AND THE PRIVATE SECTOR TO 
ACHIEVE THE OVERALL PURPOSE OF STRENGTHENING CAPACITY 
FOR SUSTAINABLE FISHERIES AND COASTAL RESOURCES 
MANAGEMENT?
4.3.1. FINDINGS
Literature Review: There is clear evidence from project records, reports, and indicators in the PITT70
that FCMCBSP collaborated with a wide range of non-UCC stakeholder groups in the execution of its 
key activities as was anticipated in the original project proposal and results framework (Table 4). One 
major achievement of FCMCBSP—which was not envisioned in the original proposal—was the addition 
of the other four Ghanaian universities working on fisheries and coastal management as key institutional 
partners by ensuring some of the lead current and retired faculty and students at these four institutions 
benefitted either directly or indirectly from many aspects of the project (Table 4).
70 Indicators 7, 8, 9, and 10 track the number of people trained; Indicator 11 tracks the number of food security private 
enterprises, CBOs, and NGOs the project is collaborating with (180 percent of target); and Indicator 22 tracks the number of 
civil society organizations (CSOs) and government agencies strengthened (120 percent of target) in the FCMCBSP PITT (Annex 
III).
32 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 4. FCMCBSP Collaboration with Principal Stakeholders 
Activities Govt Non-UCC 
Academic
Other 
Projects
Civil Society 
Organizations 
(CSOs)/NGOs
Producer 
Groups Media
1.1.1-1.1.3. UCC 
infrastructure
X X
1.2.1. UCC 
faculty/staff capacity￾building
SFMP
1.2.2. 
Operationalization of 
CCM
SFMP
1.2.3. Post-graduate 
training support
X SFMP X X
1.2.4. Undergraduate 
research grants
X
1.2.4.b. Undergraduate 
internships
X
2.1.1.-2.1.4. Research 
assessments
X X
2.1.5. Monitor coastal 
ecosystems
X SFMP
& CSLP
X
2.1.6. FishCoMGhana X X X
2.2.1-2.1.4. Short-term 
trainings
X X SFMP
& CSLP
X X X
2.2.5. Policy 
engagement
-Conferences X X SFMP
& CSLP
X X X
-Journal X X X
-Society X X
2.2.6. Partnerships X X SFMP
& CSLP
X X X
2.2.7. Wetlands 
monitoring 
X X
2.2.8-2.2.9. Livelihoods X
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaires, FGDs, KIIs, and literature review.
FGDs/KIIs and Online Questionnaires: The majority of the stakeholder respondents to the online 
questionnaires and FGDs agreed (Table 5): 
• FCMCBSP’s collaboration with a wide range of partners helped “strengthen the global capacity for 
sustainable fisheries and coastal resources management in Ghana;”71
• FCMCBSP created a series of platforms to facilitate collaboration between itself and these 
partners that strengthened UCC’s collaboration with these different groups and their 
collaboration with one another; 
• Their collaboration with FCMCBSP built the capacity of their personal technical and scientific 
knowledge and networks in ways they continue to use;
• This increased capacity has in many cases increased the quality of their agency’s fisheries and 
coastal management support; and
71 Twelve (12) of the 14 FGDs (86 percent) that ranked this capacity agreed (Annex IV, Table 11). 
33 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• This increased capacity strengthened the partner organization’s core capacity for sustainable 
fisheries and coastal resources management.72
Table 5. Respondents Who Agreed with Statements About the Extent to Which FCMCBSP’s 
Capacity Strengthening Activities Built Their Personal Capacity and the Organizational Capacity of 
Their Institutions on FCMCBSP’s Government, NGO, and Media Partners in the FCMCBSP Final 
Evaluation
Evaluation Questions Government 
(especially MoFAD) NGOs Media
N=70 N=9 N=17
FCMCBSP has improved my personal knowledge 96% 100% 94%
I expect to continue to use the skills and networks I acquired 
as result of FCMCBSP in the future
100% 100% 100%
The colleagues from my ministry/agency who participated have 
used that information to build the capacity of other colleagues
80% 67% 71%
FCMCBSP’s capacity-building activities have increased the 
quality of my media outlet ministry/agency’s support to 
fisheries and coastal management issues
80% 100% 94%
Source: Annex IV, Tables 19, 26, and 29. FCMCBSP Final Evaluation online questionnaires. January 2020.
Two of the most widely cited examples of best practices in institutional collaboration were FCMCBSP’s 
partnerships with MoFAD and USAID-funded SFMP (Text Box 3; Table 4).
73
Text Box 3. Examples of Best Practice of FCMCBSP’s Collaboration with Two Key Partners—
MoFAD and SFMP 
Partnership with MoFAD: From the start, the FCMCBSP Project Manager and M&E Coordinator made a 
conscious effort to facilitate the MoFAD Director’s participation in the project’s annual strategic planning. They 
also gave the MoFAD Director a leadership role in the design and execution of the two conferences and the 
write up and validation of the conference communiqués. Based on the results of the FCMCBSP-sponsored 
baseline research and assessment of marine fisheries governance issues (Activity 2.1.2), FCMCBSP focused on 
building the technical capacity of MoFAD’s district and zonal staff to provide informed input and data to support 
improved NRM and coastal management decisions through short-term trainings and conference participation.74
Partnership with SFMP: Many MoFAD, Fisheries Commission, and private stakeholders cited the 
collaboration between SFMP and FCMCBSP as so strong it was often hard to see where one project started and 
the other one ended.75 This collaboration was facilitated by the earlier collaboration USAID nurtured through 
ICFG (2011-2015) and further strengthened by SFMP’s commitment to devoting between 5-10 percent of its 
budget to support joint activities with UCC (Annex V, Table 50).76
Source: FCMCBSP Final Evaluation FGDs and Online Questionnaires. January 2020.
72 About half of the UCC respondents to the online questionnaire felt the one group they had not worked with sufficiently 
were the “international NGOs working on coastal resource management in Ghana” (Annex IV, Table 17, Question 33).
73 Annex IV, Table 17, Question 33.
74 Based on the initial governance study, FCMCBSP decided to concentrate its short-term training of government staff—
especially staff associated with the Fisheries Commission—at the district and zonal levels.
75 In many cases the evaluators had to explain SFMP and FCMCBSP were not the same project since many stakeholders thought 
they were given their high levels of collaboration on most activities.
76 Some key outputs of this collaboration, which strengthened the impact of the project on sustainable fisheries and coastal 
resources management, were: 1) a series of exchange visits and capacity-building exchanges that opened the eyes of the faculty, 
administration, and some sector actors to new ideas about teaching, curriculum, extension, and outreach; 2) URI’s mentorship 
34 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Unfortunately, it is very difficult to track the impact of these collaborative activities or their broader 
organizational impact of these collaborations—even those with SFMP and MoFAD (Text Box 3)—
because: 1) the project never created a beneficiary stakeholder database for specific institutions; and 2) 
there was no focused strategy for ongoing communication with the project’s key focal points in each 
stakeholder group.77 The same lack of structured communication made it difficult for CCM staff to know 
what type of follow-up training or technical assistance might be needed, and seems to have reduced the 
extent to which the individuals who got the training were willing and/or able to cascade that training to 
their colleagues (Table 5). 
4.3.2. CONCLUSION
Most stakeholders felt FCMCBSP’s broad-based collaboration with a representative sample of the 
sector’s most critical institutional and project partners has strengthened their personal capacity and that 
this capacity-building is contributing to NRM in Ghana. To date, however, it is hard to show a solid link 
between these capacity-building efforts and the types of institutional capacity-building the project was 
designed to facilitate because it never developed a beneficiary database or focused communication 
strategy to facilitate communication, capacity-building, and coordination with key partners.
4.3.3. RECOMMENDATIONS
Important Bridge Institutional Activities for the Coming Year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 
2021)
Recommendation 3.3. New communication and extension strategy (FY 2020-future):
• Recommendation 3.3.a. Beneficiary database: Over the next year, the CCM 
Communications and Extension Officer needs to collaborate with the CCM Database Lead on 
the development of a new CCM communication and extension strategy to: 1) identify the 
principal CCM partners under FCMCBSP and their current priorities for the next phase of 
capacity-building with CCM; and 2) develop and use a beneficiary stakeholder database to track 
CCM’s progress toward the achievement of this capacity-building and extension strategy. This 
new strategy should: 
- Start with a policy decision from the PMB and CCM Director about which FCMCBSP 
partners will be included.
- Solicit input from other projects (like the former Africa Lead Project in Ghana) about how 
the beneficiary database should be designed and what privacy safeguards need to be put in 
place.
- Collaborate with the CCM Database Lead on the development of a separate beneficiary 
database for each institution to track these individuals, protect their privacy, and generate 
email lists for announcements.
- Identify and confirm (by one-on-one discussions with the individual and their supervisor/s) 
two appropriate focal points (one female and one male) in each of the identified partner 
groups.
of CCM as an institution—both during its initial conception and its scale up; as well as 3) some of FCMCBSP’s most innovative 
teaching and extension and platforms it plans to scale up and continue such as the UCC-URI J-term, joint grooming of graduate 
students and dual-degree programs with URI, JFCoM and FASoG, undergraduate research fellowships, and conferences.
77 Although the project made a concerted effort to ensure all key stakeholder groups were informed about the different 
platforms, most of this information—especially the information about the short-term trainings, the invitations to the 
conferences and workshops, and the way information was transmitted through a letter of invitation or announcement—went to 
the project’s principal contact person. Since many MoFAD supervisors were new, they would typically transmit the letter to the 
next level supervisor under them, and sometimes key national, regional, and district people who were working with FCMCBSP 
or one of the other USAID-funded projects would not be invited to a key event like a specialized training or conference. 
35 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
- Consider conducting personal visits (via Skype or Zoom if not face-to-face) to each focal 
person to get to know them and inventory the most relevant staff positions (and staff 
currently in these positions) and their contact information, taking into account the group 
selected is representative of the partners' staff working on NRM and coastal resources 
management and includes a representative number of women as well as men (ideally 50 
percent).
- Enter the feedback from the interviews and two-way communication with the focal person 
into the database.
- Continue to track all participation of partner staff in the database.
- Conduct an annual review of the database to ensure its accuracy.
Recommendation 3.4. New CCM short-term training strategy (FY 2020-future): Over the 
next year, the Training Lead will develop the new fee-based system for managing and updating the five 
FCMCBSP short-term trainings (Activities 2.2.1-2.2.4, Text Box 1). These activities should:
• Recommendation 3.4.a. Organizational set up: Have a consultant from a qualified 
institution that has set up similar types of university-based fee-based training systems advise 
CCM how to set up training, marketing, monitoring, and billing systems.
• Recommendation 3.4.b. Cascade training: Consider adding an extra day of Training of 
Trainers (ToT) training to each of the five core short-term training modules to facilitate the 
trainees conducting cascade trainings for their colleagues.
• Recommendation 3.4.c. Database: Ensure future programs consider recording unique 
identifiers that can be entered into the new communication and extension database for future 
tracking and networking. This system will also help UCC’s future projects avoid double counting 
when compiling the number of people trained, which most donor-funded projects require.
4.4. EVALUATION QUESTION 4: TO WHAT EXTENT HAS THE PROJECT 
ADDRESSED THE GENDER ISSUES RELATED TO CAPACITY-BUILDING 
AMONG THE DIFFERENT GROUPS OF BENEFICIARIES AND WHAT 
HAS THE IMPACT BEEN?
4.4.1. FINDINGS
There was no mention of gender or any targets for gender in the original project plan USAID/Ghana 
approved for FCMCBSP.78 As part of its agreement with USAID/Ghana, FCMCBSP was required to 
conduct a gender mainstreaming plan “to ensure gender issues are addressed in the implementation of
FCMCBSP within the first year.”79 This exercise, which was completed in April 2015, included a complete 
review of project documents, a survey completed by 25 key informants, two FGDs with staff and 
students, and several in-depth interviews with selected staff. Based on the information collected, the 
consultant hired to conduct the gender audit exercise facilitated a full-day workshop during which 26 
78 UCC. 2014. Detailed Program Description: Provision of Technical and Financial Support at the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences, University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: DFAS for USAID/Ghana. July 2014 . 
79 The gender audit was conducted with reference to the Toolkit for Mainstreaming Gender in Higher Education in Africa 
developed by the Association for the Development of Education in Africa (Working Group on Higher Education). The tool 
identifies key institutional domains for mainstreaming gender (e.g. policies and strategies, human resource development and 
management, curriculum, research methods, support programs, student access and retention, gender violence and sexual 
harassment, gender-disaggregated data, and resource mobilization for gender equity), which became the focus areas for DFAS’s 
gender audit. This framework was complemented with aspects of the Moser Gender Framework in order to analyze the extent 
to which the gender roles and needs were considered in the project planning processes, as well as the USAID Gender 
Mainstreaming Tool Kit. (UCC. 2015. USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. 
Gender Audit Report and Mainstreaming Action Plan. Cape Coast: UCC for USAID/Ghana [April 2015]. Pg. 10).
36 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
participants reached agreement on a list of conclusions in four areas (institutional arrangement and 
development, program development project performance measurement, M&E, and gender analyses of 
implementing agencies) and identified 52 recommendations to address these issues.
The evaluators based their assessment of EQ 4 on: 1) the extent to which some of the main issues 
identified in the 2015 gender audit and mainstreaming plan were addressed by FCMCBSP; and 2) the 
different stakeholders’ perspective on gender integration and what FCMCBSP has achieved based on the 
feedback from the online questionnaires and FGDs.
Early Evidence of Results in the Four Areas Targeted by the Gender Mainstreaming Plan
Key Areas of Progress: Based on this comparison, it is clear FCMCBSP made measurable progress in 
addressing many of the key issues identified by the 2015 gender mainstreaming plan, specifically:
1. Institutional arrangement and development: Set targets for and achieved an affirmative 
action plan for gender parity in the full operationalization of CCM (KRA 1.2) that resulted in 50 
percent of the 12 UCC staff and 61 percent of the eight attached CCM senior staff being female 
by the end of the project (March 30, 2020).
2. Program development: 
PIR 1: Organizational and human capacity strengthened:
- Set an affirmative action target for FCMCBSP-funded scholarships and research that resulted 
in the majority of FCMCBSP-supported graduate students who completed the DFAS post￾graduate program being female (61 percent of M.Phil. students; 75 percent of Ph.D. 
students).
- Supported UCC’s existing policies designed to prevent gender discrimination and sexual 
harassment, as well as accommodations to facilitate pregnant students being able to 
continue their classroom and field work, which contributed to high rates of female post￾graduate student retention (100 percent of FCMCBSP-funded post-graduate students).
- Co-developed (with ACECoR) a new course unit on “Gender Issues in Fisheries” that is
now a core course requirement for all DFAS post-graduate students.
- Set targets and encouraged a recruitment process that led to 30-36 percent of the 154 
fellowships awarded to undergraduate students at UCC and its four sister institutions being 
awarded to female students in fisheries and coastal management programs.
PIR 2: Increased information and knowledge for natural resource management:
- Provided financial support (through FCMCBSP undergraduate research grants and the post￾graduate fellowships) that ensured a high percentage of the graduate students (61 percent) 
and undergraduate students (30 percent) who participated in the assessments were female. 
This resulted in 75 percent of the Ph.D. theses, 50 percent of the M.Phil. theses, and 30
percent of the undergraduate reports being written by women.
- Helped rebrand the concept of fisheries and coastal management research and employment 
as a male-dominated sphere by: 1) encouraging and facilitating 43 student presentations on 
research results (70 percent by women) at the 2017 and 2019 policy conferences; and 2) 
ensuring most FCMCBSP-funded dissertations and many student undergraduate reports are 
posted on FishCoMGhana, which has a wide national and international audience (Annex V,
Tables 43, 44, and 45).
- Set strict gender targets for all community-based activities and required all consultants and 
NGOs charged with executing these activities to monitor and report on these targets,
which led to the active engagement of women in all community-based activities and 
workshops (51 percent of the 360 community-based workshop participants) verified in the 
evaluators’ FGDs with these groups (Annex V, Table 47).
37 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
3. Project performance measurement, monitoring, and evaluation: Used disaggregated data 
for setting gender targets and reporting on most of its trainings and scholarship-supported 
activities.
4. Gender analyses of implementing agencies:
PMB: Based on recommendations from the gender mainstreaming plan, added another senior 
UCC official to the PMB and tried to build its members’ understanding of gender issues and 
their relevance to the project.
Program implementation team: Increased the number and status of women on the PITT
(see above) and ensured the team was well trained in the UCC human resources guidance on 
gender and able to mainstream that guidance and the targets for gender into their programs 
even though UCC never authorized the request to have a full-time gender focal point.
Areas Where the Project Was Less Successful:
Ensuring equitable participation of women in UCC partner organizations (NGOs, local, regional 
and national agencies): In order to ensure the project achieved its broader goal of building the 
capacity of key government and NGO partners in fisheries and coastal management, the gender 
mainstreaming plan recommended FCMCBSP develop a “communications strategy with gender 
considerations”80 that: 1) guided media and publication activities of the project; 2) ensured men and 
women were equally represented and actively participated in activities; and 3) ensured due 
consideration be given to times, venues, and other roles of men and women that limited their 
participation in project activities.
Unfortunately, FCMCBSP never developed this type of gender sensitive communication strategy. Instead,
most invitations to short-term trainings were sent to regional government directors or the head of the 
NGO or producer group—who tended to be men and often had little or no familiarity with the 
project—and the invitations did not set targets for female participation. One of the unintended results 
of this informal method for distributing the invitations—which was confirmed by almost all FGDs and 
KIIs with government, NGOs, and producer groups—skewed attendance toward males. Records show 
only 30 percent of the 357 people who participated in FCMCBSP-sponsored short-term trainings were 
women (Annex V, Table 46). One of the most vivid illustrations of this is although about half of 
MoFAD’s senior technical staff and 30 percent of its junior staff were women, only 23 percent of 
MoFAD’s district-level staff short-term training and conference participants were women. 81
Ensuring equitable participation of women in the UCC partner organizations (NGOs, local, 
regional and national agencies): Many of the same invitation issues that skewed enrollment in short￾term trainings also skewed attendance in the biannual conferences, where only 23 percent of the 
registered attendees in FY 2017 and 29 percent of the attendees in FY 2019 were women (Annex V,
Table 48). Some MoFAD and Ghana Inshore Trawlers Association (GITA) staff interviewed noted that 
although many of the conference topics focused on processing, storage, and market issues directly 
relevant to women (who tend to dominate the commercialization of fish), there was little emphasis on 
the wider issues like low education levels and weak access to credit and extension likely to impede the 
rapid scale up of these new promising technologies in Ghana. 
Community-based activities: Most FGD participants agreed with the project data that showed 
although FCMCBSP was successful in ensuring women were targeted by the community-level activities, 
80 UCC. 2015. USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Gender Audit Report and 
Mainstreaming Action Plan. Cape Coast: UCC for USAID/Ghana [April 2015]. Pg 31).
81 MoFAD project data and MoFAD 2017 annual report. Della E. McMillan, Lynn Hurtak, and Annie Dela Akanko. 2019. 
Evaluation Work Plan: Final Performance Evaluation of FCMCBSP. Accra: METSS II Project. Annex V.
38 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
they were only successful in building women’s access to more sustainable livelihoods in the two 
communities affected by the wetlands monitoring with schools programs (Section 4.1.2).
Feedback from the Online Questionnaire: In general, the results for the 21 FCMCBSP staff and 
board members (Stakeholder Group 1) and 23 other UCC faculty who participated in the program 
(Stakeholder Group 3.A) showed (Annex IV, Tables 17 and 22): 
• Ninety-six (96)-100 percent of the 44 UCC respondents agreed FCMCBSP “effectively addressed 
the gender issues related to the capacity-building of students at UCC,” with 75 percent strongly 
agreeing; and
• Ninety (90)-91 percent agreed FCMCBSP addressed the gender issues related to capacity￾building in sustainable fisheries and coastal resource management.
The 21 Stakeholder 1 respondents accorded lower rankings to other areas (Annex IV, Table 17):
• Only 67 percent agreed the project “effectively addressed the gender issues related to the capacity￾building of the faculty;”
• Only 57 percent agreed the project effectively addressed the capacity-building of the regional, 
district, and zonal offices of the principal ministries;
82 and
• Seventy-one (71)-86 percent stated the project effectively addressed the gender issues in its two 
community-based initiatives.
When asked to compare the consideration of gender in FCMCBSP’s outreach activities, 96 percent of 
the 24 DFAS faculty respondents felt the project adequately addressed the gender issues related to the 
conference, versus 78 percent for the short-term training participants (Annex IV, Table 22).
4.4.2. CONCLUSIONS
The fact that USAID required FCMCBSP to organize a rigorous gender audit as the basis of its gender 
mainstreaming plan in the sixth month of the project helped it better target some of the most critical 
issues related to gender for its different beneficiary groups since neither the approved project proposal 
nor the original strategic plan had addressed any of these issues.
The same analysis highlights FCMCBSP’s effectiveness in achieving measurable results in each of the four 
areas targeted by the gender mainstreaming plan, even though the original project budget did not 
include any provisions for a gender focal point or special funds that could be used for some of the key 
activities recommended by the plan like gender training and gender modules.
There is also abundant evidence from the online questionnaires, FGDs, and KIIs that the strategy was 
successful in addressing the gender issues related to capacity-building of the UCC students and
undergraduate students who participated in the short-term research grants at UCC and its four sister 
university programs, but less successful in dealing with the principal gender constraints associated with 
the faculty and staff affiliated with the projects’ principal government, producer group, and university 
partners. Although the program was very attentive to encouraging the active participation of women in 
the community-based activities, these activities were only successful in building women’s access to IGAs
and improved NRM management practices in one of the two pilot initiatives (the wetlands management 
project with public schools).
Two of the best indicators of the successful impact of the 2015 gender mainstreaming plan on UCC’s 
commitment to addressing the gender issues related to capacity-building among the different groups of 
82 The 24 Stakeholder Group 3 respondents.
39 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
beneficiaries are: 1) the prominent role gender plays in the new grants the two programs have attracted;
and 2) many of the recommendations identified in the original gender mainstreaming plan are being 
continued and scaled up after the project’s end with support from some of the grants.
4.4.3. RECOMMENDATIONS
Important Bridge Institutional Activities for the Coming Year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 
2021)
Recommendation 3.3. New CCM communication and extension strategy (FY 2020-future)
(as recommended in the 2015 gender mainstreaming plan):
• Recommendation 3.3.b. New procedure for issuing invitations to sponsored events 
(FY 2020-future):
- Recommendation 3.3.b.i. Invitations: Ensure all invitations to sponsored events (i.e.,
events where the cost of the individual participating is being subsidized by a donor) take into 
account the wider context of capacity-building goals CCM has established in its new 
communication and extension strategy.
- Recommendation 3.3.b.ii. Gender targeting: When open-ended invitations are issued 
to an institution, ensure they indicate a quota for female participants.
- Recommendation 3.3.b.iii. Stakeholder beneficiary database: Ensure any individual 
who participates in a sponsored or non-sponsored event is entered into the database.
Recommendation 3.5. New CCM gender and youth development strategy (FY 2020-future)
(as recommended in the 2015 gender mainstreaming plan):
• Recommendation 3.5.a. Gender Lead: Appoint a gender platform leader and ensure this 
person is appropriately trained and linked to other faculty and centers working on gender issues 
at UCC and its four sister universities to confirm appropriate focus and tracking of gender in all 
CCM and DFAS activities.
• Recommendation 3.5.b. Social science collaboration: Strengthen CCM’s involvement 
with social scientists and gender specialists working on gender issues in the fisheries sector in 
UCC and other public, private, and donor institutions in Ghana.
• Recommendation 3.5.c. Collaboration with CCM Communication and Extension 
Lead: Work closely with the CCM Communication and Extension Lead to identify 
opportunities to support successful initiatives already working on gender issues in the fisheries 
sector by posting information about them on FishCoMGhana, or having them give a 
presentation at a workshop or the biannual conference.
4.5. EVALUATION QUESTION 5: TO WHAT EXTENT ARE THE USAID/UCC 
FCMCBSP CAPACITY STRENGTHENING INTERVENTIONS LIKELY TO 
CONTINUE AFTER UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT (USG) SUPPORT 
ENDS.
4.5.1. FINDINGS
EQ 5.A: Is stakeholder buy-in likely to continue or be increased after the current project
expires?
The original approved FCMCBSP proposal did not anticipate the need for FCMCBSP to develop a 
sustainability plan for any of its investments. There was, however, an implicit understanding that the 
program’s results would be mainstreamed into core DFAS and CCM projects. For this reason the 
40 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
consultants have based their assessment on the feedback from the FGDs, KIIs, and online questionnaires
about: 1) the current level of buy-in from different stakeholders for different categories of activities
designed to achieve each KRA (in the sense that stakeholders express their interest in continuing an 
activity after the project closes); and 2) whether this activity is likely to be sustainable in the medium and
longer term within the current and projected context of support for DFAS and CCM at UCC.
The responses to the online questionnaires, FGDs, and KIIs highlight the extremely high levels of buy-in 
from a wide cross-section of stakeholders who expect to continue to use the skills and knowledge 
acquired from these activities. At the same time, there was a cross-cutting concern in the questionnaire 
responses and FGDs that conditions for sustaining many activities and platforms are not established 
(Table 6).
41 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 6. Level of Stakeholder Buy-in by Category for Key FCMCBSP Activities, the Likelihood These Activities Can Be Sustained Over the 
Short and Medium Term,83 and Key Challenges for Sustainability
Level of Activity Stakeholder Buy-in
Short 
Term 
(1-5 Yrs)
Medium
Term 
(6-10 Yrs)
Key Challenges for Sustainability
Infrastructure
Laboratory Strong country and regional demand 
for the laboratory and supported by 
ACECoR 
Yes Likely Business Plan/Procedures: No business plan to ensure 
systematic billing and cost recovery from GoG, private 
sector, and donor-funded projects
Library, vehicles, research 
equipment
Strong UCC demand for the library, 
vehicles, and research equipment to 
support other grant and non-grant￾funded activities of students and 
faculty 
Likely Likely Procedures/Overhead: Very small percentage of overhead 
on student scholarships (like from ACECoR) returns to 
department in ways that can be used to renew equipment 
or support 
Procedures/Health and Safety Plan: Although DFAS 
developed a health and safety plan for the laboratory, 
there is a need to revise this plan to adequately protect 
UCC and its students and to scale it up to other 
infrastructure
DFAS
DFAS faculty capacity Strong support from UCC and 
strong demand for faculty expertise 
in Ghana and regionally
Yes (from 
UCC)
Yes (from 
UCC)
Procedures/Faculty Incentives/Promotion and Tenure 
Requirements: Limited recognition needs to be given to 
building individual faculty members’ capacity for 
grantsmanship and recognizing grantsmanship in tenure 
and promotion decisions in order to reduce faculty 
dependence on large donor-funded grants for research
DFAS post-graduate 
training program
Sharp increase in post-graduate 
student numbers dependent on 
scholarships due to lack of a clear 
path to employment
Yes (from 
ACECoR)
Likely Curriculum: DFAS needs to strengthen the post-graduate 
employment track of the M.Phil. and Ph.D. graduates in 
ways that will attract qualified donor-funded and self￾funded applicants to the program (this was addressed in 
the design of ACECoR, which increases the chance it may 
be institutionalized into the curriculum)
Undergraduate training 
program
Low enrollment despite FCMCBSP 
investments in curriculum and 
No 
(enrollments 
down)
No unless 
branding 
changed
Procedures/Branding/Communication Strategy: Most UCC￾based stakeholders attributed this anomaly to poor 
branding of the major and employment prospects (a 
83 Yes: permanent funding or follow-on grant funding from another project assured; Likely: strong commitment to sustaining the activity but not assured by independent budget 
or support; No: not likely to be sustained without additional support from another donor-funded grant.
42 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Level of Activity Stakeholder Buy-in
Short 
Term 
(1-5 Yrs)
Medium
Term 
(6-10 Yrs)
Key Challenges for Sustainability
research grants and strong 
employment market84
similar observation was made in the 2015 FCMCBSP 
gender audit and gender mainstreaming plan)
CCM
Senior staff positions Yes (from 
UCC)
Yes (from 
UCC)
Office functioning and 
programs
Likely (grant 
dependent)
Likely but 
grant 
dependent
New Grants/Overhead/Business Plan: CCM depends on 
grants for most of its operating budget
Donor Coordination: No inter-donor coordination 
Five research assessments 
and FishCoMGhana 
Strong demand for research by 
national, regional, and international 
agencies
Strong integration of students into 
post-graduate and undergraduate 
programs is key to quality of training 
programs
UCC faculty and some faculty at 
other Ghanaian universities depend 
on the studies for tenure and 
promotion
Likely Likely Business Plan/Branding: Conditions (and costs and 
processes) for continual updating of databases not in 
place. Plan exists but not yet operationalized
Procedure/Communication Strategy: Unclear role of 
FishCoMGhana at the national level in relation to the 
other fisheries and coastal management departments and 
the general public (issue flagged by 2015 gender 
mainstreaming plan)
Short-term trainings Strong national demand for the 
short-term trainings and donor 
interest 
Likely Likely Business Plan/Donor Coordination: Draft business plan for 
offering fee-based trainings developed but not adopted
Biennial policy conference Very strong national demand for 
conference and donor interest by all 
stakeholders
Likely Likely Business Plan/Donor Coordination: No business plan for 
sustaining it despite high levels of donor interest and 
support
JFCoM and FASoG Strong interest from UCC and 
media but less well known to other 
stakeholder groups
Likely Likely Procedures/Communication Strategy: No structured publicity 
to encourage use by a wider range of stakeholders
Business Plan: No business plan 
Joint partnerships/ 
programs with URI 
(under-graduate J-term, 
dual degree program for 
Ph.D. students)
Strong demand for these programs Likely Likely Business Plan/Donor Coordination: Largely dependent on 
grants; no plan for long-term sustainability of the program 
despite high levels of donor interest
84 Tracer study shows almost 100 percent of undergraduates find employment in the field at a rate higher than most other UCC departments.
43 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Level of Activity Stakeholder Buy-in
Short 
Term 
(1-5 Yrs)
Medium
Term 
(6-10 Yrs)
Key Challenges for Sustainability
Community -based 
Activities
Wetlands ecological 
monitoring using school 
clubs and communities
Strong demand from the schools, 
NGOs, and communities and strong 
support from UCC for a linkage 
with the Ministry of Education
Likely 
schools can 
continue 
activities at 
low level 
without 
support
Additional 
scale will 
require co￾support 
from 
Ministry of 
Education 
and grants
Strategic Planning Donor Coordination: Strong support from 
Ministry but not yet part of formal curriculum and 
dependent on outside donor support
Promoting supplementary 
livelihoods in coastal 
communities
No strong demand and no model to 
scale up
No No None of the pilots were successful
Source: FCMCBSP Mid-term Evaluation FGDs, KIIs, and responses to online questionnaires. January 2020.
44 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
PIR 1: Organizational and Human Capacity Strengthened
Infrastructure: Although the short-term sustainability of the laboratory is assured because it is being 
covered by other grants, neither DFAS nor CCM has developed a business plan for how the current 
infrastructure base will be invoiced to new projects so there is a rotating fund that can be used for 
routine maintenance and renewal. 
DFAS: Although the short-term (1-5 years) sustainability of DFSA faculty resources are assured by the 
department, the sharp increase in student scholarships for post-graduate enrollments means the five 
senior DFAS faculty had to supervise 30 graduate students in 2018 and 83 in the 2019-2020 academic 
year (34 FCMCBSP funded students; 43 ACECoR-funded; and six self-funded). Although FCMCBSP 
students will graduate in August, the ratio will continue to be a problem for the next four years as DFAS 
and CCM grapple with supporting the 120 new ACECoR-funded graduate students. In the short term, 
DFAS does not want to hire additional senior faculty to correct the situation because it would block 
opportunities for younger faculty and young Ph.D. students to grow into positions. 
Although the short-term sustainability of FCMCBSP building DFAS’s post-graduate programs is 
guaranteed, this sustainability is still driven by scholarships. In 2018-19 when there were no new 
scholarships, the department had only one new application. In 2019 when DFAS offered 75 new 
scholarships, there were 700 applicants. Any long-term solution to this issue will require CCM and 
DFAS to strengthen the post-graduate employment track of the new graduates in ways that will attract 
new applicants to the program. To address this issue, ACECoR is requiring the 120 students it supports 
to have mandatory one-year paid internships with a business, NGO, international donor, university 
government office, or prospective employer. 
CCM: Now that the issue of future staffing has been resolved by UCC’s agreement to pay for the staff 
out of core funds, the chief short-term challenges to sustaining FCMCBSP’s substantial investment in 
CCM are: 1) many of its core activities and platforms are dependent on grant funding; 2) CCM has never 
developed a business plan for determining how it will invoice new grants for the use of its equipment 
and services; and 3) UCC has not established a formula for returning some of the overhead charged to 
the teaching grants to the CCM.
PIR 2: Increased Information and Knowledge for Natural Resource Management
Assessments: In the short-term (1-5 years), the prospects for maintaining and scaling up FCMCBSP 
studies are assured since: 1) ACECoR is committed to sustaining all of five research studies started 
under USAID—and is adding two more85—by providing research grants to all Ph.D. and M.Phil.-level 
students; and 2) UCC is already funding two permanent research fellow positions to lead the research 
platform activities.86
FishCoMGhana: Although ACECoR is not supporting the regular updating or scale-up of 
FishCoMGhana, the short-term prospects for sustaining this are somewhat assured because: 1) the VC 
confirmed the six permanent staff positions, one of which is scheduled to focus on database 
management; and 2) the database is already functioning. The prospects for scaling up and improving the 
database are also very good since FCMCBSP funded the development of a plan for upgrades, installing 
the necessary security features needed to control access and providing real-time, more user-friendly 
85 The two new research studies introduced under ACECoR are: 1) a blue economic and social resilience study, which 
introduces marine governance, trade, and businesses around the ocean and how these will impact livelihoods co-executed by 
the Department of Economics and DFAS; and 2) a marine metrology research study co-executed the Physics Department and 
DFAS.
86 FGD with senior DFAS faculty and board members confirmed with document review.
45 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
information to stakeholders on relevant events in order to ensure local communities and media have 
accurate information. To date, however there is no donor support for this plan.
Short-term trainings: Although the UCC administration and CCM consider the short-term trainings a 
critical platform, CCM never finalized the draft plan developed by a consultant in June 2017 for 
sustaining them. Although ACECoR is not continuing the trainings, this major constraint could easily be 
solved by focusing one of the six CCM staff on the short-term trainings and having one of the existing 
centers of excellence for university-based short-term trainings mentor CCM on how to develop a 
business plan for fee-based trainings.
Conferences: Another critical platform without a sustainability plan is the biannual conference. Although 
at least one international donor has expressed initial interest in funding the 2021 conference, nothing is 
certain. It is clear CCM needs to develop a more sustainable business model that can facilitate co￾funding from CCM and DFAS’s growing number of major and minor donors in order to avoid being 
dependent on any one donor. 
JFCoM and FASoG: Although CCM is committed to facilitating the continued operation and scale up of 
JFCoM and FASoG, it has not developed a plan for how these activities will be continued after USAID 
funding ends. Once these business plans are developed, CCM can identify what, if any, gaps in support 
might need to be covered by one of its eight existing and prospective large donors. Even though the 
prospects for sustaining and scaling up these activities are not guaranteed, most senior administrators 
and board members interviewed in the FGDs stated their chances are extremely good.
Institutional partnerships with URI: Two important joint programs FCMCBSP helped co-facilitate with 
the SFMP—the undergraduate J-term and the dual-degree for Ph.D. students—were successfully pilot 
tested under FCMCBSP and greatly appreciated by UCC faculty, students, and top administrators both 
because of their educational impact and as an example of best practice in collaboration, which UCC 
would like to scale up to other U.S. and European universities. Although the dual-enrollment project 
was conceptualized and approved by the executive boards of both universities under FCMCBSP, the 
initial pilot test of the dual-degree program is not fully funded. Although ACECoR is providing partial 
funding for the initial testing of the model, it is insufficient to cover the 15 UCC students eligible to go 
URI in August 2020. 
Community-based activities: The field visits confirmed the point made by UCC and NGO 
stakeholders that there is strong stakeholder buy-in87 from students, teachers, community leaders, and 
UCC staff and senior administration to scale up the wetlands monitoring program successfully pilot 
tested by FCMCBSP. For this scale-up to occur, however, CCM will need a separate grant since 
ACECoR can only support additional student research.
EQ 5.B: What are the lessons learned and best practices, and from which stakeholder or 
beneficiaries, in achieving results?
BEST PRACTICE
Based on FGDs, KIIs, and online questionnaire responses, the evaluation team identified eight examples 
of best practice:88
• FCMCBSP’s biannual national conference on fisheries and coastal management.89
87 See EQ 4 discussion in Section 4.4 of this report.
88 For a list of reasons some stakeholders gave for their identification of these activities as best practice, see Annex V, Table 33.
89 This activity included many sub-elements of best practice highlighted in the FGDs and online questionnaires. These include 
the way FCMCBSP: 1) involved the MoFAD Director directly in the planning and chairmanship of the workshop; 2) allowed 
46 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• The five marine and coastal research and resource assessments, which included baseline studies 
and technical input from highly qualified national consultants with complementary studies by the 
UCC DFAS graduate and undergraduate students with solid quality control and technical 
oversight from the senior DFAS faculty.90
• FCMCBSP’s use of its new system of DFAS undergraduate research fellowships to build a 
concrete linkage with its four sister DFAS departments that complemented the other ties 
developed through the research consultancies, JFCoM, FASoG, and conferences.
• The UCC-URI dual-degree program being pilot tested with DFAS before scaling up to at least 
two other UCC schools (pharmacy and business).
• The wetlands ecological monitoring project with junior high school students.91
• FCMCBSP’s decision to build GITA’s capacity through collaborative research, exchange visits to 
URI, and sponsoring some of their members’ participation in the short-term trainings, which had 
huge payoffs in terms of convincing the trawlers to support MoFAD’s announcement of Ghana’s 
first closed season.
• The short-term professional training of DFAS staff, which helped catalyze a number of critical 
curriculum changes and motivate professors to participate in the program even though they 
were not compensated for the grant activities they supported on top of their already heavy 
teaching loads.
• FCMCBSP’s four-pronged media strategy, which all stakeholders agreed dramatically increased 
media coverage of fisheries and coastal resources management issues in Ghana over the last five 
years.92
LESSONS LEARNED
In addition to the best practices identified in the FGDs/KIIs and online questionnaires, the evaluators 
identified a number of important lessons learned for future USAID and UCC programs:
• Lesson A. Design: Future university-based capacity-building initiatives need to anticipate the 
impact of successful activities on: 1) faculty-student teaching and supervision ratios; as well as 2) 
office/lecture and computer space, and help programs build the systems need to accommodate 
these effects both during and after the grant.
stakeholder groups to present in their local languages (and provided translators); 3) equipped a media room to facilitate real￾time reporting to the country at large; 4) published of a book of abstracts that permitted all of the stakeholders to choose 
which presentations to attend; 5) co-financed with SFMP; and 6) facilitated high levels of conference participants’ involvement in 
the preparation and approval of a communiqué summarizing the principal policy recommendations that came out of the 
conference, which was distributed to MoFAD for review before final adoption and then disseminated through the FCMCBSP 
Facebook page, direct postings on the journalists’ Coast to Coast, and direct emails to other important stakeholder groups.
90 Both groups of UCC students interviewed in the FGDs identified the weekly seminars as another example of best practice 
that helped them stay on track with their theses and build linkages to the new faculty and research fellows who could help them 
with data analysis and write up.
91 Most stakeholders familiar with the livelihoods activities (e.g., the UCC staff and students and administration; the current and 
former SFMP and CSLP staff, and NGO staff) strongly agreed this community-based model was an example of best practice and 
should be scaled up to all of the coastal district schools in Ghana (Annex IV, Tables 17 and 26). The former Assistant Director 
of CSLP reported he attempted to scale up the model to 20 high schools in coastal areas but only reached four due to early 
termination of funding. The NGO Friends of the Nation reported it also pilot tested a scale up of the model in one beachfront 
community near an oil-producing area. 
92 All the media experts interviewed in the media FDG identified the first media workshop in May 2017 (which involved 20 
media specialists from 15 media outlets) as a sub-best practice under this larger area of best practice. The media experts were 
invited to a five-day field tour and received on-site training on effective reporting on fisheries and coastal resources 
management issues in the local communities in all four of Ghana’s principal coastal regions, which included ample time for them 
to interview and interact with the local coastal people and an internet-equipped bus (staffed with the two consultants leading 
the study as well as other visiting experts from UCC) that permitted them to file stories between site visits. In addition to a 
flurry of print, radio, and television stories produced both during and after this initial training, they created their own 
WhatsApp group (Coast to Coast), which connected them to one another and FCMCBSP. 
47 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Lesson B. Donor supervision: USAID needs to organize capacity-building for projects to help 
them better understand grant management. 
• Lesson C. Exchange visits: Exchange visits to other centers of excellence in the first and 
second year of a new project can help jumpstart capacity-building in key areas where it is linked 
to a larger program/set of programs by helping the faculty identify new initiatives to pilot test 
and scale up. The relationship between this project and UCC nurtured under ICFG and SFMP is 
a clear example of this principle.
• Lesson D. Faculty incentives: Future capacity-building programs need to anticipate ways of 
compensating faculty and permanent staff (through salary top ups or buying back time) for their 
activities related to the grant that comply with both university and USAID rules and regulations.
• Lesson E. Workforce development and gender equity: For the full impact of USG 
investment in scholarships to train graduate students—female graduate students, in particular—
in emerging fields like fisheries and coastal resources management to have a lasting impact, it 
must be linked to activities that help them produce their first publications and transition into the 
workforce positions they need to occupy to bring about lasting change. 
• Lesson F. Sustainability plans: Future projects need to anticipate, support, and track (as part 
of the M&E system) key processes needed to sustain USG investments after a project ends from 
the start so these plans can become fully operational while the project still has money and 
before the improved infrastructure and capacity attracts other projects that may want to 
capitalize on this baseline USG investment.
• Lesson G. Bridge institutional support: Donors should anticipate the need for a certain 
amount of bridge institutional support to consolidate key capacities of a successful university￾based program if there is clear evidence the capacities the initial project helped create are being 
actively scaled up and expanded.
• Lesson H. Gender: Future university-based capacity-building programs need to encourage 
universities to integrate a holistic model of gender and youth employment into the initial
program designs as well as requiring each approved project to develop a gender mainstreaming 
plan in order to ensure appropriate staff and implementing partner support and budget lines.
• Lesson I. M&E and communications: As capacity increases, the number of activities 
increases and the number of institutional partners for a university-based capacity-building 
project are likely to increase. It is therefore very important for a university-based capacity￾building program to have a focused M&E and communications strategy backstopped by 
appropriate staff from the start in order to: 1) have an accurate accounting of all their in-kind 
and financial collaborations with other projects; 2) target and monitor the impact of their 
capacity-building activities on different stakeholder groups; 3) monitor the evolution of an 
impact for any unintended outcomes; and 4) have an accurate tracking of the project’s multiple 
activity beneficiaries and beneficiaries who only benefitted from one or two activities.
• Lesson J. Invitations to sponsored capacity-building events: Project invitations to 
trainings, conferences, and workshops can open the door to capacity-building, but also to mini￾sabbaticals from the day-to-day rigors of a job. These invitations are also greatly in demand, 
especially when they are sponsored. Future programs need to be careful how they pick who to 
invite in order to ensure the capacity-building goes to people who will actually use the training 
and the program can track who got the training and what they did with it in order to improve 
their capacity-building for future programs and policy initiatives. Given the high rates of staff 
turnover in many district-level offices of government ministries, this type of tracking is the 
responsibility of the agency charged with the capacity-building, not the agency that is reportedly 
benefitting from the capacity-building event.
48 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
4.5.2. CONCLUSIONS
EQ. 5.A: The high levels of stakeholder buy-in observed during the project are likely to continue even 
though conditions for sustaining some of the project’s key platforms—including some platforms widely 
considered to be examples of best practice—are not fully assured.
Some key second-generation institutional challenges identified in the FGDs and online questionnaires 
that need to be addressed during the transition year that follows the end of FCMCBSP include:
• Business plans: Developing, pilot testing, and scaling up the business plans needed to sustain 
some of the most critical infrastructure, equipment, vehicles, extension, communication, and 
outreach platforms created and scaled up under FCMCBSP and SFMP not scheduled for support 
under ACECoR.
• Health and safety: Developing a standard health and safety manual and certification process 
for all CCM and DFAS activities.
• Strategic planning and donor coordination: Shifting the focus of CCM’s strategic planning 
process and donor support away from project-focused to the wider mission of CCM and DFAS 
in Ghana and West Africa.
• UCC administrative support: Co-defining with the UCC administration:
- Procedures: An action plan for streamlining CCM and DFAS procedures (that complies 
with UCC rules and regulations) for accounting, procurement, equipment installation and 
maintenance, health and safety standards, M&E, communications, database management, as 
well as updates to inform ongoing and projected new activities to the new rules and 
regulations of the World Bank and other donors CCM may add over the next five years.
- Faculty incentives: An action plan for identifying new UCC-level mechanisms for 
compensating faculty for time spent on the grants and ensuring grant-getting and grant￾related activities count toward UCC tenure and promotion decisions.
EQ 5.B: The stakeholders interviewed in the FGDs and online questionnaires identified a large number 
of activities they considered to be best practices. Unfortunately, the way the M&E system was set up, it 
was often difficult to examine patterns of participation in some of these best practices (like JFCoM, 
FASoG, conferences, and different types of exchange programs), the impact of these different patterns 
of participation, or even the aggregate impact of the trainings on specific agencies or offices within a 
bigger agency.
A number of stakeholders identified various cross-cutting lessons learned, many of which could be 
applied to other types of capacity-building projects as well as UCC’s next generation of CCM and DFAS 
programming.
4.5.3. RECOMMENDATIONS
Although conditions for sustaining the most critical platform results are clearly in place, the project’s 
success has catalyzed a series of second-generation bridge institutional issues that need to be addressed 
in order to link FCMCBSP and the next generation of CCM and DFAS’s growth and development. 
Important Bridge Institutional Activities for the Coming Year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 
2021)
Recommendation 3.6 New Business/Sustainability Plans (FY 2020-future): Over the next 
year, the CCM Business Manager needs to monitor the development of the business/sustainability plans 
for each of the key CCM platforms. 
49 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Recommendation 3.6.a. Office/lectures/computer rooms: Collaborate with relevant 
university offices on the development of a business plan for capturing some of the income the 
grants are paying to the university for equipment and office renovations, informed by examples 
of best practice from various U.S. and Ghanaian universities.
• Recommendation 3.6.b. Short-term trainings: Collaborate with UCC’s training 
development unit to create: 1) a fee-based model for the short-term trainings; and 2) a 
marketing strategy for the training that will facilitate some of CCM’s existing and potential 
donors as well as other NGOs paying the cost of specific trainings for key stakeholder groups, 
informed by various examples of best practice in similar university-based programs.
• Recommendation 3.6.c. Conferences: CCM needs to closely collaborate with its new and 
existing donors to: 1) develop a new model of multi-donor support for the next biannual
fisheries and coastal management conference (in 2021); and 2) consider ways this model could 
be scaled up to workshops and future conferences.
• Recommendation 3.6.d. Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management and Fisheries 
and Aquaculture Society of Ghana: 
- Recommendation 3.6.d.i. Exchange visits: Facilitate the leaders of JFCoM and 
FASoG meeting and communicating with leaders of other successful journals and 
societies in Ghana to learn how they operate.
- Recommendation 3.6.d.ii. Scale up: Work closely with these leaders to better 
understand their future plans and what if any interest they have in getting assistance 
from any of the UCC’s existing or projected donors.
Recommendation 3.7. New Health and Safety Review Process (FY 2020-future):
• Recommendation 3.7.a. DFAS and CCM health and safety manual: Create a health and 
safety platform that identifies: 1) the health and safety procedures for all programs and program￾related infrastructure (e.g. laboratory, training, research, and equipment [including vehicles], field 
and laboratory equipment, and the research boat); 2) any recommended training and 
certification programs for faculty, students, and staff; 3) emergency protocols and contract 
language needed to ensure future contracts support these conditions and factor in the costs of 
any necessary trainings, certifications, or insurance into future contracts. This exercise should be 
informed by examples of best practices from U.S. and other Ghanaian universities.
• Recommendation 3.7.b. Health and safety training: Anticipate the need for: 1) 
familiarizing new and existing donors with these procedures during a donor coordination 
meeting or strategic planning workshop; and 2) ensuring all faculty, researchers, staff, and 
students are trained and pass certification requirements.
Recommendation 3.8. New Annual Planning Workshop and Donor Advisory Board (FY 
2020-future): Over the next year, the new CCM Donor Coordination Lead needs to consider pilot 
testing the concept of an annual planning workshop during which each project and the ten platform 
leaders present their plans for the coming year and discuss some of the most critical issues related to 
the scale up.
• Recommendation 3.8.a. Donor advisory board: Define new mechanisms for coordinating 
donor input into the annual planning workshop.
• Recommendation 3.8.b. Endowment: Identify URI’s and other partners’ interest in and 
willingness to help CCM explore developing an endowment over the next 5.5 years.
Recommendation 3.9. New UCC procedures grantsmanship action plan (FY 2020-future):
In conjunction with strategic planning activities, UCC might consider organizing a joint UCC 
50 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
administration/faculty group on grantsmanship, which could review university-level issues and 
opportunities large grants present (see Section 4.1.3., Recommendation 1.1.c.).
• Recommendation 3.9.a. Exchange visits: Leverage UCC’s contacts with URI and other 
international universities to research how they compensate staff for activities related to large 
grants, tenure and promotion, and perhaps even request a Fulbright study tour of different U.S. 
universities to examine different examples of best practice.
• Recommendation 3.9.b. Action plan: Consider ways UCC can better compensate faculty 
and staff who attract and manage grants that are compatible with UCC’s rules and regulations.
• Recommendation 3.9.c. Procurement, accounting, and development office 
procedures: Continue to monitor the action plan and pilot activities identified to streamline 
these procedures during the FCMCBSP closeout sessions.
4.6. EVALUATION QUESTION 6: WHICH USAID/UCC FCMCBSP 
CAPACITY-BUILDING ACTIVITIES ARE THE MOST AND LEAST 
EFFECTIVE IN IMPROVING SUSTAINABLE MANAGEMENT OF 
GHANA’S MARINE AND COASTAL RESOURCES?
4.6.1. FINDINGS
The genius of FCMCBSP was its commitment to the identification, pilot testing, and partial scale up of a 
large number of different platforms that built the capacity of different stakeholder groups from the 
grassroots to the upper echelons of the Ghana government. For this reason, it is not surprising each of 
the stakeholder groups identified some of the same activities—like the short-term trainings—as both 
most and least effective. (Table 7).
Table 7. Sample Stakeholder Rankings of Which FCMCBSP Capacity-strengthening Activities Were 
Most and Least Effective at Improving Sustainable Management of Ghana’s Marine and Coastal 
Resources93 94
Activity FCMCBSP 
Staff
UCC Faculty & 
Researchers Govt
NGOs & 
Producer 
Group
Media
Number of Respondents (n=x) N=21 N=23 N=70 N=9 N=17
Activities Ranked Most Effective
Renovating and equipping the 
fisheries and coastal research 
laboratory
71% 61%
Refurbishing and equipping 
office/lecture/computer rooms and 
library
48% 26%
Acquisition of vehicles 39%
Operationalization of CCM 67% 35%
Support for postgraduate (M.Phil. & 
Ph.D.) training program 
86% 43%
Short-term trainings 91% 67% 59%
Biannual policy conferences 43% 17% 67% 24%
Workshops 21% 71%
93 This table includes only a partial list of the main rankings. See Annex IV, Tables 18, 20, 23, 27, and 30 for a full list of rankings.
94 Methodology: Percentage represents the percentage of individuals who responded to the questionnaires who ranked the 
activity as one of the top five most or least successful FCMCBSP activities.
51 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Activity FCMCBSP 
Staff
UCC Faculty & 
Researchers Govt
NGOs & 
Producer 
Group
Media
Academic and technical staff capacity 
strengthening
65%
Cuttlefish research project 44%
Activities Ranked Least Effective 
Short-term trainings 29%95 56% 35%
Analysis of value chains of the fish 
trade
57% 48%
Strengthening community-based 
groups96
71%
Promoting supplementary livelihoods 
in coastal communities
86% 35%
Wetlands ecological health 
monitoring using school clubs and 
communities
24% 35%
Research activities 23%
Policy formulation review 23%
Cuttlefish research project 11%
Conferences 26% 78% 41%97
Workshops 10% 24%
Source: FCMCBSP Final Evaluation online questionnaires, January 2020. Annex IV, Tables 18, 20, 23, 27, and 30.
4.6.2. CONCLUSIONS
Stakeholder perceptions of the most effective and least effective activities varied widely depending upon 
their special needs and concerns. Based on the feedback the evaluators received during FGDs and KIIs, 
it was this willingness to diversify and respond to the different needs and concerns of these audiences 
that accounts for 96 percent of the government, NGO/producer groups, and media stakeholders who 
responded to the online questionnaire (n=96) and 84 percent of the FCMCBSP faculty, staff, and board 
and DFAS staff (n=44) agreeing “FCMCBSP has improved my personal technical and scientific knowledge of 
the most critical issues related to fisheries and coastal resource management.” (Annex IV, Tables 14 and 15).
4.6.3. RECOMMENDATIONS
Important Bridge Institutional Activities for the Coming Year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 
2021):
Recommendation 3.2. New CCM M&E Strategy (FY 2020-future):
• Recommendation 3.2.a. (same as in Section 4.2.3) Full-time M&E officer: Future 
CCM-managed projects should anticipate the need for a qualified full-time M&E officer from the 
start, and make sure all staff and CCM M&E officers are trained in the M&E regulations of 
specific projects from the start.
95 This low ranking is attributed to the stakeholders’ sense that the project did not adequately target trainings to many of the
government staff that needed it. 
96 This activity was executed by the same consultant-led team that executed the livelihood activities. 
97 This low ranking seems to be related to the fact that only a small percentage of the journalists who were given invitations to 
the biannual policy workshop had their participated supported (i.e., per diem, gas, and lodging) for the conferences. In contrast, 
the project was able to support a larger number of journalists attending the workshops. 
52 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Recommendation 3.2.b. (same as in Section 4.2.3) Internal indicators: If any new 
project activities are added that are not tracked by the indicators in the M&E plan, develop a set 
of internal indicators that can track both participation and impact.
• Recommendation 3.2.c. Global strategy: Develop an M&E global strategy for the DFAS 
and UCC units that applies to all projects.
• Recommendation 3.2.d. M&E training: Ensure the CCM M&E Officer is trained and 
receives full documentation on all new donor rules and expectations for reporting whenever a 
new CCM or DFAS program is funded.
• Recommendation 3.2.e. Database: Ensure any new CCM and DFAS programs use the CCM 
and DFAS stakeholder beneficiary database to track their participants from the start.
• Recommendation 3.2.f. M&E training: Facilitate an annual one-day course on M&E for the 
VC and all senior management to ensure the head administrators understand M&E and grant 
reporting requirements.98
98 This recommendation was made by the UCC VC, who has already approached FCMCBSP management about providing this 
training.
53 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ANNEX I. FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS, AND 
RECOMMENDATIONS TABLE
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
EQ 1. To what extent 
has the USAID/UCC 
FCMCBSP achieved its 
intended goal and 
objectives as defined by 
the results framework?
EQ 1.a. PIR 1: 
Strengthened 
organizational and human 
capacity: Has 
organizational and human 
capacity been strengthened 
as a result of improved 
infrastructure (KRA 1.1) 
and increased technical 
and scientific knowledge 
(KRA 1.2)?
EQ 1.b. PIR 2: Increased 
information and knowledge 
for NRM: Have efforts to 
increase marine and 
coastal research and 
resource assessment (KRA 
2.1) and improved 
The evaluators confirmed through the online questionnaires, 
FGDs, and review of the project’s summary data that FCMCBSP 
successfully strengthened the core organizational and human 
capacity of UCC in sustainable fisheries and coastal management 
by: 
• KRA 1.1. Renovating and refurbishing the DFAS laboratory, 
computer rooms, and library and acquiring field equipment; and
• KRA 1.2. Building the capacity of a core group of 
professionally trained research staff, lecturers, and technicians
attached to DFAS and CCM to carry out research and provide 
training to UCC graduate and undergraduate students as well 
as undergraduates in the sister programs of the other four 
Ghanaian universities working on fisheries and coastal resource 
management issues.
Over the last five years, DFAS and CCM leveraged this increased 
capacity to attract two additional major grants (from the World 
Bank [$6,399,999] and DANIDA [$800,000]) and four minor 
grants (from the National Geographic Society [$50,000], French 
Embassy [$4,750], The World Academy of Sciences [$8,941], and 
Australian AID [$60,000]), and is currently in negotiation with the 
African Union, Germany, and Norway about other types of future 
collaboration (Annex V. Table 17).
In large part because of FCMCBSP’s start-up investment and early 
success in attracting additional grants, UCC is now widely 
recognized as being the lead university-based center for fisheries 
Short-term Closeout (March 2020):
• 1.1. Closeout planning processes: Expand the focus 
of FCMCBSP’s closeout processes to include two 
outside facilitators, one appointed by the UCC VC as his 
personal representative and one from outside UCC.
o 1.1.a. New staffing and management plan:
Identify and define the position descriptions of the 
ten most critical CCM staff identified for the next 
phase, including: 1) general administration/office 
management; 2) M&E; 3) extension and 
communication; 4) partner coordination; 5) online 
data resources; 6) gender; 7) health, safety, and risk 
management; 8) training, workshops, and 
conferences; 9) donor coordination; and 10) 
research.
o 1.1.b. Bridge transition year strategic plan:
Develop a draft program plan for all activities and 
funded projects during this transition year identifying 
how the project plans to address key issues identified 
in the final evaluation (i.e., the first year FCMCBSP 
ends [April 30, 2020-March 30, 2021]).
o 1.1.c. Administrative procedure review and 
action plan: 
- 1.1.c.i. Rules and regulations: Review principal 
lessons learned from FCMCBSP regarding UCC 
99 The recommendations are numbered as follows:
• All recommendations in the 1.x sequence are for closeout/transition activities (March 2020);
• All recommendations in the 2.x sequence are for most pressing bridge-funding institutional issues for the coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021); and
• All recommendations in the 3.x sequence are for important bridge institutional activities for the coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021).
54 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
communication, extension 
and outreach (KRA 2.2) 
resulted in increased 
information and knowledge 
for NRM?
and coastal management and as an emerging regional West 
African Center of Excellence as witnessed by its January 2019 
receipt of the World Bank ACECoR project.
The eight most frequently noted factors project staff felt had a 
negative impact on the project’s achievement of its intended goal 
and objectives as defined by the results framework were: 
1. The contract language for the G2G grant, which did not allow 
for any direct institutional support to UCC through overhead 
nor for the project to buy back staff time, since this was 
considered counterpart funding.
2. The original budget in the approved grant was made in dollars 
but the project was paid in cedis, so the actual amount of 
money dispersed to the project was less than originally 
budgeted since the project was often forced to purchase 
equipment in dollars, which required the reconversion of the 
cedis back to dollars. 
3. UCC’s cumbersome procurement, accounting, and 
development office procedures were the source of major 
delays in getting equipment and starting many activities on 
time. 
4. The UCC development office, which is charged with managing 
the physical refurbishment of offices and labs, had very little 
experience in managing grants activities and created a host of 
bottlenecks in executing grants.
5. The high rates of turnover in the university accountant 
positions (four times over the life of the project) necessitated 
constant retraining.
6. A one-year delay in the receipt of project funds from USAID 
in early 2017 (FY 2016), which caused may FCMCBSP 
activities to be eliminated or delayed.
7. The national hiring freeze on government employment, which 
delayed the process needed to transform the FCMCBSP 
temporary staff positions into permanent CCM positions.
8. Project leaders did not understand the importance of having a 
well thought out M&E and communication strategy from the 
start or how this could complicate (and undervalue) the 
project’s ability to track its impact and results.
rules and regulations concerning procurement, 
accounting, and the development office.
- 1.1.c.ii. Procedures: Develop a joint action plan 
to pilot test new ways of streamlining these 
procedures.
- 1.1.c.iii. Visits and assistance: Facilitate this 
process by promoting exchange visits and technical 
assistance.
• 1.2. DFAS laboratory:
o 1.2.a. ISO accreditation and manual: Ensure the 
DFAS consultant charged with completing the ISO 
accreditation and developing a laboratory user and 
safety manual finishes before FCMCBSP closes.
o 1.2.b. Equipment procurement: Speed up 
procurement to get the missing parts the DFAS 
consultant needs to get the AAS and GC equipment 
in the laboratory fully installed before FCMCBSP 
closes.
Most pressing bridge-funding institutional issues for 
the coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021):
Four areas were identified where there is a pressing need 
for additional USAID support to complete certain activities 
critical to building the new institutional framework that 
DFAS and CCM need to link the FCMCBSP achievements 
to their new, more expanded donor portfolio.
• 2.1. UCC-URI dual-degree program: (slated to 
start August 2020) Consider providing the 
complementary support DFAS needs to assist the ten 
Ph.D. students scheduled to start the dual enrollment 
program in August 2020 to buy UCC-URI extra time to 
tap other donor and internal resources for future 
funding.
• 2.2. DFAS writing workshops: Consider 
supplementing support for and scaling up of the writing 
workshop UCC is already planning to encourage the 
consultants and graduate students who participated in 
55 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
Five of the most frequently cited factors that the UCC and 
USAID-funded projects who were interviewed in the FGD 
identified as facilitating the project’s effectiveness, efficiency, and 
results were:
1. The project’s strong committed leadership from its Manager, 
M&E Coordinator, and Board.
2. The well-trained project staff.
3. The project’s strong collaboration with URI, which was 
nurtured through two USAID-funded projects (ICFG and 
SFMP), helped create and maintain a series of synergistic 
relationships that increased the effectiveness, efficiency, and 
impact of all three projects.
4. USAID/Ghana’s willingness for the project to pilot test a large 
number of innovative new sub-activities and platforms not in 
the original proposals.
5. The active support of UCC administration, which included: 1) 
transforming the position of the CCM Coordinator into a 
directorship; 2) providing in-kind support for electricity, 
water, and space; 3) providing the salaries for all of the 
professors and the two senior laboratory managers; 4) 
agreeing to create and fund two permanent research fellow 
positions for CCM; 5) providing a $100,000 no-interest loan 
facility to the project in FY 2016 when USAID/Ghana
experienced a delay in receiving its funding from Washington; 
and 6) agreeing to convert the six temporary staff positions in 
CCM (which were scheduled to end March 30, 2020) into 
permanent research fellow positions (despite a nation-wide 
hiring freeze) starting May 1, 2020. 
Although FCMCBSP has not completed sustainability plans for 
most of its activities, there is a strong commitment by staff to 
maintaining and scaling up most of the activities and platforms 
created—even those not being supported by ACECoR—now 
that the UCC VC has assured CCM the six FCMCBSP staff 
positions will become permanent.
Challenge #1: Developing a draft one-year transition action plan 
for CCM management capable of managing the massive increase 
in activities accompanying the new projects FCMCBSP attracted.
the studies—as well as any faculty who backstopped 
them in the past or is willing to in the future—to 
complete drafts and submit them to refereed journals
for publication. Since the majority of the graduate 
students are women and publishing these articles is 
essential to them getting hired by UCC and the other 
Ghanaian universities, this activity will strengthen 
FCMCBSP’s long-term gender impact.
• 2.3. CCM and DFAS job fair support: Consider 
assisting DFAS and CCM to develop better models for 
helping their graduate students get jobs and/or the post￾doctoral opportunities or internships likely to lead to 
jobs. This is an activity that could be managed by a 
retired professor from UCC or another university who 
is well known to prospective employers. This professor 
could: 1) conduct a quick-start employment and 
networking opportunities analysis for the fisheries and 
coastal management sector in Ghana; 2) use this 
information to develop a series of virtual and in-person 
job fair presentations by prospective public-sector 
employers or agencies offering post-docs; and 3) coach 
FCMCBSP-funded graduates to become more 
entrepreneurial and consistent in their job searches and 
interviewing skills. If this pilot is successful in getting 
students jobs over the next years, CCM and DFAS 
could try to institutionalize this type of career 
counseling into the mainstream DFAS programs.
• 2.4. DFAS senior fellows program: Help DFAS pilot 
test two options for reducing the steep faculty-student 
ratio that is one of the negative unintended 
consequences of the sharp increase in graduate student 
funding since FY 2015. These options include:
o 2.4.a. Sabbaticals: Pilot test a senior fellows 
program at DFAS and CCM to provide top ups for 
senior faculty from other Ghanaian and regional 
universities to supplement their sabbatical pay in 
56 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
Challenge #2: Accelerating the procurement processes needed 
to complete the installation of the laboratory and ISO 
certification.
Challenge #3: Addressing four outstanding issues needed to 
consolidate FCMCBSP’s results:
• #3.A. Fully funding the initial pilot test of the URI-UCC dual￾degree program.
• #3.B. Increasing publication on the five FCMCBSP research 
projects.
• #3.C. Assisting the 34 FCMCBSP students finding the types of 
permanent employment in the sector expected from the 
FCMCBSP-funded scholarships. 
• #3.D. Mitigating the impact of the sharp increase in the faculty￾student ratio on training and research quality.
Activities that increased the supply of quality marine and 
coastal research and research assessments: All major UCC 
and non-UCC stakeholders interviewed in FGDs and KIIs 
confirmed the project increased the supply of high-quality marine 
and coastal research and assessments used to inform some of the 
most critical national-level policy debates on fisheries and coastal 
management issues over the last five years. They and the 
technical review were also able to identify several important 
policy decisions—like the saiko ban and the country’s first one￾month closed season—that were set in motion by the studies’ 
results.
Activities that increased stakeholders’ access to quality 
marine and coastal research and research assessments:
Another important achievement of FCMCBSP was the creation of 
several critical platforms that increased stakeholder access to 
high-quality marine and coastal research and assessments and 
reports, including:
• The FishCoMGhana online database;
• The biennial fisheries and coastal management conferences;
• A series of five short-term courses used to train staff 
associated with the different stakeholder groups;
return for agreeing to mentor, supervise, chair, 
and/or co-chair student thesis committees, and 
possibly even teach some critical courses.
o 2.4.b. Fulbright Fellows: Ask USAID to fast 
forward a UCC request for two Fulbright teaching 
positions in DFAS for the 2020-21 academic year 
that could hopefully be renewed for the next five 
years.
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• A four-pronged media development strategy widely heralded 
by all stakeholders for having dramatically increased media 
coverage on fisheries and coastal resource management issues 
in Ghana;
• The country’s first fisheries and coastal management journal, 
JFCoM; and
• The country’s first national professional association in the 
sector, FASoG.
EQ. 1.c. Has the 
implementation of coastal 
community-based activities 
resulted in increased 
opportunities for NRM or 
income generation among 
the rural families and has it 
impacted the targeted 
communities?
Livelihood activities: The unsuccessful execution of 
FCMCBSP’s support for livelihood activities using a series of 
short-term consultant contracts backstopped by technical experts 
from UCC and other sources highlights the need for CCM to 
develop an alternative model to achieve its official mandate for 
community-level outreach and extension.
Wetlands monitoring: The community-based FGDs confirmed 
NGO studies’ results that show FCMCBSP successfully: 1) co￾piloted a new model for promoting ecological monitoring of 
wetlands with two IGAs in the affected communities; and 2) built 
the capacity of the schools to improve community advocacy with 
local authorities in the governance of fisheries and coastal 
resources. Although there is a great deal of anecdotal evidence 
from interviews with former students that the program 
influenced their higher education decisions (as well as their and 
their families’ continued support for improved NRM and coastal 
management issues), this was not tracked by the NGOs’ research 
or M&E systems, which focused primarily on the project’s short￾term impact on NRM practices.
NGO capacity: The active engagement of FCMCBSP—in 
combination with other supports from the USAID-funded CSLP 
and SMFP—on the FCMCBSP wetlands monitoring activity 
contributed to the technical and organizational capacity of the 
two most active NGOs working on coastal management and 
fisheries issues in Ghana, which they are scaling up or intending 
to scale up to other communities they serve in conjunction with 
other USG and non-USG-funded projects.
Important bridge institutional activities for the 
coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021):
• 3.1. New CCM extension programs (FY 2020-
future):
o 3.1.a. Community-based activities: Consider 
shifting the focus of CCM’s extension mandate away 
from direct execution of community-based activities 
toward backstopping successful NGO and 
government-led initiatives at the community level.
o 3.1.b. Scale up opportunities: Consider 
examining ways its highly successful community￾based wetlands monitoring program (which is linked 
to one of the DFAS-supervised research programs) 
could be scaled up through another donor-funded 
project.
o 3.1.c. Monitoring: Consider ways the M&E of 
CCM’s community-based activities could be 
strengthened by involving more UCC faculty and 
students from social science departments.
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EQ 2. What unintended 
outcomes have the 
USAID/UCC FCMCBSP’s 
capacity strengthening 
activities achieved 
relevant to improving 
sustainable management 
of Ghana’s marine and 
coastal resources?
Some of the key unintended outcomes of FCMCBSP include: 
• The dual-enrollment degree, joint grooming of graduate 
students, and J-term programs with URI; 
• Media training initiatives; 
• The biannual policy conference;
• Establishment of the first wet laboratory (to complement the 
DFAS laboratory the grant envisioned)
• Undergraduate research grants;
• JFCoM; and
• FASoG. 
All but two of these were conceptualized during the staff and 
administrators’ initial exchange visit to URI. USAID/Ghana’s 
flexible budget process and supervision helped encourage UCC’s 
willingness and ability to pilot test and scale up these promising 
initiatives.
Many of these unintended outcomes created the chief 
mechanisms for FCMCBSP stakeholders, who responded to the 
online questionnaire report that they have used and are likely to 
continue to use capacity built to build and maintain the 
professional skills and knowledge they developed under 
FCMCBSP. 
The majority of the same non-UCC respondents to the online 
questionnaires and FGD participants reported these activities 
increased the organizational capacity of their institutions, which 
included:
• The national, regional, and district-level offices of MoFAD and 
the Fisheries Commission;
• The project’s two main NGO partners (Friends of the Nation 
and Hen Mpoano);
• UCC’s four sister universities with DFAS departments (UG, 
UDS, KNUST, and UENR); 
• 25 national and regional media outlets; and
• The two other USAID-funded fisheries and coastal 
management projects in Ghana (CSLP and SFMP).
To date, however, it is hard to track the participation of or
benefits accruing to particular groups and sub-groups of 
Important bridge institutional activities for the 
coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021):
• 3.2. New CCM M&E strategy (FY 2020-future):
o 3.2.a. Full-time M&E officer: Future CCM￾managed projects should anticipate the need for a 
qualified full-time M&E officer from the start and 
make sure all staff and CCM M&E officers are trained 
in the M&E regulations of specific projects from the 
start.
o 3.2.b. Internal indicators: If any new project 
activities are added that are not tracked by the 
indicators in the M&E plan, be sure to develop a set 
of internal indicators that can track both 
participation and impact.
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stakeholders due to the way the M&E system was managed 
during the first three years.
EQ 3. To what extent 
has the USAID/UCC 
FCMCBSP collaborated 
with other USAID￾funded projects such as 
CSLP, SFMP, and GoG 
partners such as MoFAD, 
other donor projects and 
the private sector to 
achieve the overall 
purpose of strengthening 
capacity for sustainable 
fisheries and coastal 
resource management?
Other USAID-funded projects: FCMCBSP collaborated with 
its sister USAID-supported projects at all levels (planning, 
financial, co-monitoring, and networking), which contributed 
greatly to the success of the project. To date, however, DFAS 
and CCM have been unable to fully document the cash and in￾kind contributions of the two sister projects for the top UCC 
administration requesting this information because it was not 
tracked from the beginning.
MoFAD: Although MoFAD staff who responded to the online 
questionnaire were enthusiastic about the impact their 
participation in FCMCBSP activities had on their personal careers, 
they confirmed this increased individual capacity did not 
necessarily translate into improved institutional capacity. This was 
attributed to: 1) very little structured follow-up to trainings or 
conferences at specific district and zonal offices, or even 
producer organizations or NGOs; and 2) the way invitations to 
the trainings and conferences were issued to institutional 
representatives (rather than focal points), which limited the 
continuity and cascading impact of the collective trainings and 
outreach activities.
NGO and producer organizations: All NGO and private 
producer organization staff responding to the online 
questionnaire stated their capacity was dramatically increased by: 
1) their joint execution of some of the FCMCBSP research 
activities; and 2) their participation in the FCMCBSP-sponsored 
short-term trainings and extension, communication, and outreach 
activities. This impact was especially pronounced in one of NGOs 
where a broad cross-section of the staff participated. The impact 
of this collaboration was less pronounced in the second NGO, 
where most of the training and outreach activities were routed 
through a single individual who did not cascade the trainings and 
is no longer employed by the NGO.
Important bridge institutional activities for the 
coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021):
• 3.3. New communication and extension strategy 
(FY 2020-future):
o 3.3.a. Beneficiary database: Over the next year, 
the CCM communications and extension officer 
needs to collaborate with the CCM database lead 
on the development of a new CCM Communication 
and Extension Strategy to identify: 1) the principal 
CCM partners under FCMCBSP and their current 
priorities for the next phase of capacity-building 
with CCM; and 2) a strategy for the development 
and use of a beneficiary stakeholder database to 
track CCM’s progress toward the achievement of 
this capacity-building and extension strategy. This 
new CCM Communication and Extension Strategy 
should: 
- Start with a policy decision from the Board and 
CCM Director about which partners from 
FCMCBSP will be included in the new strategy.
- Solicit input from other projects (like the former 
Africa Lead Project in Ghana) about how the 
beneficiary database should be designed and what 
privacy safeguard measures need to be put in 
place.
- Collaborate with the CCM database lead on the 
development of a beneficiary database for each 
institution that can be used to track these
individuals, protect their privacy, and generate 
email lists for announcements.
- Identify and confirm (by one-on-one discussions 
with the individual and their supervisor/s) two 
appropriate focal points (one female and one male) 
in each of the identified partner groups.
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- Consider conducting personal visits (via Skype or 
Zoom if not face-to-face)to each focal person to 
get to know them and inventory the most relevant 
staff positions (and staff currently in these 
positions) and their contact information, taking
into account that the group selected is 
representative of the partners staff working on 
NRM and coastal resource management and 
includes a representative number of women as 
well as men (ideally 50 percent).
- Enter the feedback from the interviews and two￾way communication with the focal person into the 
database.
- Continue to track all participation of partner staff 
in the database.
- Conduct an annual review of the database to 
ensure its accuracy.
• 3.4. New CCM short-term training strategy (FY 
2020-future): Over the next year, the Training Lead 
will develop the new fee-based system for managing and 
updating the five FCMCBSP short-term trainings.
o 3.4.a. Organizational set up: Have a consultant 
from a qualified institution that has set up similar 
types of university-based fee-based training systems 
advise CCM how to set up training, marketing, 
monitoring, and billing systems.
o 3.4.b. Cascade training: Consider adding an extra 
day of ToT training to each of the five core modules 
that will facilitate the trainees conducting cascade 
trainings for their colleagues.
o 3.4.c. Database: Ensure future programs consider 
recording unique identifiers that can be entered into 
the new communication and extension database for 
future tracking and networking. This system will also 
help UCC’s future projects avoid double counting 
when compiling the number of people trained, which 
most donor-funded projects require.
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EQ 4. To what extent 
has the project
addressed the gender 
issues related to 
capacity-building among 
different groups of 
beneficiaries and what 
has the impact been?
There was no mention of gender or any targets for gender in the 
original project plan USAID/Ghana approved for FCMCBSP. As 
part of its agreement with USAID/Ghana, FCMCBSP was required 
to conduct a gender mainstreaming plan “to ensure gender issues 
are addressed in the implementation of FCMCBSP within the first 
year.” This exercise, which was completed in April 2015, included 
a complete review of the project and identified a series of 
recommendations for strengthening the consideration of gender 
in four key area. 
Based on a comparison of the baseline gender mainstreaming plan 
with the current situation of the gender mainstreaming in the 
project based on the project’s internal documentation, the 
evaluators concluded that the FCMCBSP was very effective in 
addressing many of the most pressing issues that had been 
identified as potential issues or problems in each of these key 
areas.
#1. Institutional arrangement and development: Set 
targets for and achieved an affirmative action plan for gender 
parity in the full operationalization of CCM (KRA 1.2) that 
resulted in 50 percent of the 12 UCC staff and 61 percent of the 
eight attached CCM senior staff being female by the end of the 
project (March 30, 2020).
#2. Program development: 
PIR 1: Organizational and human capacity strengthened: 
- Set an affirmative action target for FCMCBSP-funded 
scholarships and research that resulted in the majority of 
FCMCBSP-supported graduate students who completed 
the DFAS post-graduate program being female (61 
percent of M.Phil students; 75 percent of Ph.D. 
students).
- Supported UCC’s existing policies designed to prevent 
gender discrimination and sexual harassment, as well as 
accommodations to facilitate pregnant students being 
able to continue their classroom and field work, which 
contributed to high rates of female post-graduate 
student retention (100 percent of FCMCBSP-funded 
post-graduate students).
Important bridge institutional activities for the 
coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021):
• 3.3. New CCM communication and extension 
strategy (FY 2020-future) (as recommended in 
the 2015 gender mainstreaming plan):
o 3.3.b. New procedure for issuing invitations 
to sponsored events (FY 2020-future):
- 3.3.b.i. Invitations: Ensure all invitations to 
sponsored events (i.e., events where the cost of 
the individual participating is being subsidized by a 
donor) take into account the wider context of 
capacity-building goals CCM has established in its 
new communication and extension strategy.
- 3.3.b.ii. Gender targeting: When open-ended 
invitations are issued to an institution, ensure they 
indicate a quota for female participants.
- 3.3.b.iii. Stakeholder beneficiary database:
Ensure any individual who participates in a 
sponsored or non-sponsored event is entered into 
the database.
• 3.5. New CCM gender and youth development 
strategy (FY 2020-future) (as recommended in 
the 2015 gender mainstreaming plan):
o 3.5.a. Gender Lead: Appoint a gender platform 
leader and ensure this person is appropriately 
trained and linked to other faculty and centers 
working on gender issues at UCC and its four sister 
universities to confirm appropriate focus and 
tracking of gender in all CCM and DFAS activities.
o 3.5.b. Social science collaboration: Strengthen 
CCM’s involvement with social scientists and 
gender specialists working on gender issues in the 
fisheries sector in UCC and other public, private, 
and donor institutions in Ghana.
o 3.5.c. Collaboration with CCM 
Communication and Extension Lead: Work 
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- Co-developed (with ACECoR) a new course unit on 
“Gender Issues in Fisheries” that is now a core course 
requirement for all DFAS post-graduate students.
- Set targets and encouraged a recruitment process that 
led to 30-36 percent of the 154 fellowships awarded to 
undergraduate students at UCC and its four sister 
institutions being awarded to female students in fisheries 
and coastal management programs.
PIR 2: Increased information and knowledge for natural 
resource management:
- Provided financial support (through FCMCBSP 
undergraduate research grants and the post-graduate 
fellowships) that ensured a high percentage of the 
graduate students (61 percent) and undergraduate 
students (30 percent) who participated in the 
assessments were female.
- Helped rebrand the concept of fisheries and coastal 
management research and employment as a male￾dominated sphere by: 1) encouraging and facilitating 43 
student presentations on research results (70 percent by 
women) at the 2017 and 2019 policy conferences; and 2) 
ensuring most FCMCBSP-funded dissertations and many 
student undergraduate reports are posted on 
FishCoMGhana, which has a wide national and 
international audience.
- Set strict gender targets for all community-based 
activities and required all consultants and NGOs charged 
with executing these activities to monitor and report on 
these targets, which led to the active engagement of 
women in all community-based activities and workshops 
(51 percent of the 360 community-based workshop 
participants) verified in the evaluators’ FGDs with these 
groups.
#3. Project performance measurement, monitoring, and 
evaluation: Used disaggregated data for setting gender targets 
and reporting on most of its trainings and scholarship-supported 
activities.
closely with the CCM Communication and 
Extension Lead to identify opportunities to support 
successful initiatives already working on gender 
issues in the fisheries sector by posting information 
about them on FishCoMGhana, or having them give 
a presentation at a workshop or the biannual
conference.
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#4.Gender analyses of implementing agencies:
PMB: Based on recommendations from the gender 
mainstreaming plan, added another senior UCC official to the 
PMB and tried to build its members’ understanding of gender 
issues and their relevance to the project.
Program implementation team: Increased the number and status 
of women on the PITT (see above) and ensured the team was 
well trained in the UCC human resources guidance on gender 
and able to mainstream that guidance and the targets for gender 
into their programs even though UCC never authorized the 
request to have a full-time gender focal point.
There is also abundant evidence from the final performance 
evaluation online questionnaires, FGDs, and KIIs that the strategy 
was successful in addressing the gender issues related to capacity￾building of the UCC students and undergraduate students who 
participated in the short-term research grants at UCC and its 
four sister university programs, but less successful in dealing with 
the principal gender constraints associated with the faculty and 
staff affiliated with the projects’ principal government, producer 
group, and university partners. Although the program was very 
attentive to encouraging the active participation of women in the 
community-based activities, these activities were only successful 
in building women’s access to IGAs and improved NRM 
management practices in one of the two pilot initiatives (the 
wetlands management project with public schools).
Two of the best indicators of the successful impact of the 2015 
gender mainstreaming plan on UCC’s commitment to addressing 
the gender issues related to capacity-building among the different 
groups of beneficiaries are: 1) the prominent role gender plays in 
the new grants the two programs have attracted; and 2) many of 
the recommendations identified in the original gender 
mainstreaming plan are being continued and scaled up after the 
project’s end with support from some of the grants.
EQ 5. To what extent 
are the USAID/UCC 
FCMCBSP capacity 
strengthening 
Although ACECoR is helping sustain and scale up the 
organizational and technical capacity of CCM by facilitating the 
construction of a new building containing additional laboratory 
space, funding another 30 Ph.D. and 90 M.Phil. students, and using 
Important bridge institutional activities for the 
coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021)
• 3.6 New business/sustainability plans (FY 2020-
future): Over the next year, the CCM Business 
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interventions likely to 
continue after USG 
support ends?
EQ 5.a. Is stakeholder buy￾in likely to continue or be 
increased after the current 
project expires?
these students to scale up all five existing research and 
assessment programs started under FCMCBSP (with the addition 
of two new cutting-edge research programs), this rapid expansion 
has created a number of second-generation institutional 
challenges (e.g., post-USG-funding) CCM and DFAS must deal 
with if they are to manage the new program and maintain some 
of their principal outreach, communication, and extension 
platforms. 
Some key second-generation institutional challenges identified in 
the FGDs and online questionnaires that need to be addressed 
during the transition year that follows the end of FCMCBSP 
include:
• Business plans: Developing, pilot testing, and scaling up the 
business plans needed to sustain some of the most critical 
infrastructure, equipment, vehicles, extension, communication, 
and outreach platforms created and scaled up under 
FCMCBSP and SMFP that are not scheduled for support 
under ACECoR.
• Health and safety: Developing a standard health and safety 
manual and certification process for all CCM and DFAS 
activities.
• Strategic planning and donor coordination: Shifting the 
focus of CCM’s strategic planning process and donor support 
away from project-focused to the wider mission of CCM and 
DFAS in Ghana and West Africa; and
• UCC administrative support: Co-defining with the UCC 
administration:
o Procedures: An action plan for streamlining CCM and 
DFAS procedures (that comply with UCC rules and 
regulations) for accounting, procurement, equipment 
installation and maintenance, health and safety standards, 
M&E, communications, database management, as well as 
updates to inform ongoing and projected new activities to 
the new rules and regulations of the World Bank and 
other new donors CCM may add over the next five years.
Manager needs to monitor the development of the 
business/sustainability plans for each of the key CCM 
platforms. 
o 3.6.a. Office/lectures/computer rooms:
Collaborate with relevant university offices on the 
development of the business plans for all of the 
FCMCBSP-funded infrastructure (including 
laboratories, office equipment, computers, and 
vehicles) that is informed by examples of best 
practice from various U.S. and Ghanaian 
universities.
o 3.6.b. Short-term trainings: Collaborate with 
UCC’s training development unit on creating: 1) a 
fee-based model for the short-term trainings; and 
2) a marketing strategy for the training that will 
facilitate some of CCM’s existing and potential 
donors as well as other NGOs paying the cost of 
specific trainings for key stakeholder groups, 
informed by various examples of best practice in
similar university-based programs.
o 3.6.c. Conferences: CCM needs to closely 
collaborate with its new and existing donors to: 1) 
develop a new model of multi-donor support for 
the next biannual fisheries and coastal 
management conference (in 2021); and 2) consider 
ways this model could be scaled up to workshops 
and future conferences.
o 3.6.d. Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management and Fisheries and Aquaculture 
Society of Ghana: 
- 3.6.d.i. Exchange visits: Facilitate the leaders of 
JFCoM and FASoG meeting and communicating 
with leaders of other successful journals and 
societies in Ghana to learn how they operate.
- 3.6.d.ii. Scale up: Work closely with these 
leaders to better understand their future plans and 
what if any interest they have in getting assistance 
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o Faculty incentives: An action plan for identifying new 
UCC-level mechanisms for compensating faculty for time 
spent on the grants and ensuring that grant-getting and 
grant-related activities count toward the UCC tenure and 
promotion decisions.
from any of the UCC’s existing or projected 
donors.
• 3.7. New health and safety review process (FY 
2020-future)
o 3.7.a. DFAS and CCM health and safety 
manual: Create a health and safety platform that 
identifies: 1) the health and safety procedures for all 
programs and program-related infrastructure (e.g.,
laboratory, training, research, and equipment 
[including vehicles], field and laboratory equipment, 
and the research boat); 2) any recommended 
training and certification programs for faculty, 
students, and staff; 3) emergency protocols and 
contract language needed to ensure future 
contracts support these conditions and factor in the 
costs of any necessary trainings, certifications, or 
insurance into future contracts. This exercise 
should be informed by examples of best practice 
from U.S. and other Ghanaian universities.
o 3.7.b. Health and safety training: Anticipate the 
need for: 1) familiarizing new and existing donor 
with these procedures during a donor coordination 
meeting or strategic planning workshop; and 2) 
ensuring all faculty, researchers, staff, and students 
are trained and pass certification requirements.
• 3.8. New annual planning workshop and donor 
advisory board (FY 2020-future): Over the next 
year, the new CCM Donor Coordination Lead needs to
consider pilot testing the concept of an annual planning 
workshop during which each project and the ten 
platform leaders present their plans for the coming year 
and discuss some of the most critical issues related to 
the scale up.
o 3.8.a. Donor advisory board: Define new 
mechanisms for coordinating donor input into the 
annual planning workshop.
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o 3.8.b. Endowment: Identify URI’s and other 
partners’ interest in and willingness to help CCM 
explore developing an endowment over the next 
5.5 years.
• 3.9. New UCC procedures grantsmanship action 
plan (FY 2020-future): In conjunction with strategic 
planning activities, UCC might consider organizing a 
joint UCC administration/faculty group on 
grantsmanship, which could review university-level 
issues and opportunities large grants present (see 1.1.c. 
in EQ 1 above).
o 3.9.a. Exchange visits: Leverage UCC’s contacts 
with URI and other international universities to 
research how they compensate staff for activities 
related to large grants, tenure and promotion, and 
perhaps even request a Fulbright study tour of 
different U.S. universities to examine different 
examples of best practice.
o 3.9.b. Action plan: Consider ways UCC can 
better compensate faculty and staff who attract and 
manage grants that are compatible with UCC’s rules 
and regulations.
o 3.9.c. Procurement, accounting, and 
development office procedures: Continue to 
monitor the action plan and pilot activities identified 
to streamline these procedures during the 
FCMCBSP closeout sessions.
EQ 5.b. What are the 
lessons learned and best 
practices, and from which 
stakeholder or 
beneficiaries, in achieving 
results?
The stakeholders interviewed in the FGDs and online 
questionnaires identified a large number of activities they 
considered to be best practices. Unfortunately, the way the M&E 
system was set up, it is often difficult to examine current patterns 
of participation in some of these best practices (like the Journal, 
Society, conferences, and different types of exchange programs), 
the impact of these different patterns of participation, or even the 
aggregate impact of the trainings on specific agencies or offices 
within a bigger agency.
Examples of best practice:
1. FCMCBSP’s biannual national conference on fisheries 
and coastal management.
2. The five marine and coastal research and resource 
assessments, which included baseline studies and 
technical input from highly qualified national 
consultants with complementary studies by the UCC 
DFAS graduate and undergraduate students with solid 
quality control and technical oversight from the senior 
DFAS faculty.
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A number of stakeholders identified various crosscutting lessons 
learned, many of which could be applied to other types of 
capacity-building projects as well as UCC’s next generation of 
CCM and DFAS programming.
3. FCMCBSP’s use of its new system of DFAS 
undergraduate research fellowships to build a concrete 
linkage with its four sister DFAS departments that 
complemented the other ties developed through the 
research consultancies, JFCoM, FASoG, and 
conferences.
4. The UCC-URI dual-enrollment program being pilot 
tested with DFAS before scaling up to at least two 
other UCC schools (pharmacy and business).
5. The wetlands ecological monitoring project with junior 
high school students.
6. FCMCBSP’s decision to build GITA’s capacity through 
collaborative research, exchange visits to URI, and 
sponsoring some of their members’ participation in the 
short-term courses, which had huge payoffs in terms of 
convincing the trawlers to support MoFAD’s 
announcement of Ghana’s first closed season.
7. The short-term professional training of DFAS staff, 
which helped catalyze a number of critical curriculum 
changes and motivate professors to participate in the 
program even though they were not getting 
compensated for the grant activities they supported on 
top of their already heavy teaching loads.
8. FCMCBSP’s four-pronged media strategy, which all 
stakeholders agreed dramatically increased media 
coverage of fisheries and coastal management issues in 
Ghana over the last five years.
Cross-cutting lessons learned:
Lesson A. Design: Future university-based capacity￾building initiatives need to anticipate the impact of 
successful activities on: 1) faculty-student teaching and 
supervision ratios; as well as 2) office/lecture and computer 
space, and help programs build the systems need to 
accommodate these effects both during and after the USG￾funded grant.
68 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
Lesson B. Donor supervision: USAID needs to organize
capacity-building for projects to help them better 
understand grant management. 
Lesson C. Exchange visits: Exchange visits to other 
centers of excellence in the first and second year of a new 
project can help jumpstart the capacity-building needed in 
key areas where it is linked to a larger program/set of 
programs by helping the faculty identify new initiatives to 
pilot test and scale up. The relationship between this 
project and UCC that was nurtured under the ICFG and 
the SFMP is a clear example of this principle.
Lesson D. Faculty incentives: Future capacity-building 
programs need to anticipate ways of compensating faculty 
and permanent staff (through salary top ups or buying back 
time) for their activities related to the grant that comply 
with both university and USAID rules and regulations.
Lesson E. Workforce development and gender 
equity: For the full impact of USG investment in 
scholarships to train graduate students—female graduate 
students, in particular—in emerging fields like fisheries and 
coastal management to have a lasting impact, it must be 
linked to activities that help them produce their first 
publications and transition into the workforce positions 
they need to occupy to bring about lasting change. 
Lesson F. Sustainability plans: Future projects need to 
anticipate, support, and track (as part of the M&E system) 
key processes needed to sustain USG investments after the 
project ends from the start so these plans can become fully 
operational while the project still has money and before the 
improved infrastructure and capacity attracts other 
projects that may want to capitalize on this baseline USG 
investment.
Lesson G. Bridge institutional support: Donors should 
anticipate the need for a certain amount of bridge 
institutional support to consolidate key institutional 
capacities of a successful university-based program IF there 
69 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
is clear evidence the capacities the initial project helped 
create are being actively scaled up and expanded.
Lesson H. Gender: Future university-based capacity￾building programs need to encourage universities to 
integrate a holistic model of gender and youth employment 
into the initial program designs as well as requiring each 
approved project to develop a gender mainstreaming plan 
in order to ensure appropriate staff and implementing 
partner support and budget lines. 
Lesson I. M&E and communications: As capacity 
increases, the number of activities increases and the 
number of institutional partners for a university-based 
capacity-building project are likely to increase. It is 
therefore very important for a university-based capacity￾building program to have a focused M&E and 
communications strategy backstopped by appropriate staff 
from the start in order to: 1) have an accurate accounting 
of all their in-kind and financial collaborations with other 
projects; 2) target and monitor the impact of their capacity￾building activities on different stakeholder groups; 3) 
monitor the evolution of an impact for any unintended 
outcomes; and 4) have an accurate tracking of the project’s 
multiple activity beneficiaries and beneficiaries who only 
benefitted from one or two activities.
Lesson J. Invitations to sponsored capacity-building 
events: Project invitations to trainings, conferences, and 
workshops can open the door to capacity-building, but also 
to mini-sabbaticals from the day-to-day rigors of a job. 
These invitations are also greatly in demand, especially 
when they are sponsored. Future programs need to be 
careful how they pick who to invite in order to ensure the 
capacity-building goes to people who will actually use the 
training and the program can track who got the training and 
what they did with it in order to improve their capacity￾building for future programs and policy initiatives. Given the 
high rates of staff turnover in many district-level offices of 
government ministries, this type of tracking is the 
70 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Evaluation Questions Summary Findings and Conclusions
Summary Recommendations for the Closeout and 
Following Year and Cross-Cutting Lessons Learned 
to Inform Future Programming99
responsibility of the agency charged with the capacity￾building, not the agency that is reportedly benefitting from 
the capacity-building event.
EQ 6. Which 
USAID/UCC FCMCBSP 
capacity-strengthening 
activities are the most 
and least effective at 
improving sustainable 
management?
The online questionnaires and FGDs showed wide variation in 
stakeholder rankings of what constituted the most and least 
effective FCMCBSP activities, which was largely based on their 
personal experiences with FCMCBSP and context.
Although the stakeholders interviewed expressed their verbal 
appreciation of specific groups of activities, it was difficult to 
document the impact of these activities on stakeholder capacity 
because many of these activities started after FCMCBSP created 
its M&E plan.
Important bridge institutional activities for the 
coming year (April 1, 2020-March 30, 2021)
• 3.2. New CCM M&E strategy (FY 2020-future)
o 3.2.a. (from EQ 2 above) Full-time M&E 
officer: Future CCM-managed projects should 
anticipate the need for a qualified full-time M&E 
officer from the start and make sure all staff and 
CCM M&E officers are trained in the M&E 
regulations of specific projects from the start.
o 3.2.b. (from EQ 2 above) Internal indicators: 
If any new project activities are added that are not 
tracked by the indicators in the M&E plan, be sure 
to develop a set of internal indicators that can track 
both participation and impact.
o 3.2.c. Global strategy: Develop an M&E global 
strategy for the DFAS and UCC units that applies 
to all projects.
o 3.2.d. M&E training: Ensure the CCM M&E 
Officer is trained and receives full documentation 
on all new donor rules and expectations for 
reporting whenever a new CCM or DFAS program 
is funded.
o 3.2.e. Database: Ensure any new CCM and DFAS 
programs use the CCM and DFAS stakeholder 
beneficiary database to track their participants from 
the start.
o 3.2.f. M&E training: Facilitate an annual one-day 
course on M&E for the VC and all senior 
management to ensure the head administrators 
understand M&E and grant reporting requirements.
71 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ANNEX II. EVALUATION 
STATEMENT OF WORK
STATEMENT OF WORK
Final Performance Evaluation
of
USAID/Ghana’s University of Cape Coast (UCC) Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building 
Support Project
1.0 PURPOSE OF THE EVALUATION
The purpose of the final evaluation is to assess the extent to which the goal and objectives of the UCC 
Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support (USAID/UCC FCMCBS) Project have been 
achieved, and how the implementation of the project interventions have contributed to achieving 
USAID/Ghana’s CDCS DO.2: Sustainable and broadly shared economic growth, and its sub-IR 2.4.2: 
Improved local community management of natural resources. The evaluation will specifically identify 
project components, which either worked well or not, and why to serve as learning to inform future 
design of similar projects.
The evaluation will provide USAID, its implementing partners and stakeholders in the fisheries and 
coastal management sector with data on outcomes, best practices and lessons learned to inform future 
programming.
Audience and Intended Users
The USAID/Ghana Mission, the donors of the project, will be the primary user of the evaluation report. 
The implementing partner, UCC Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (DFAS), will use the 
evaluation findings to determine how the attainment of the project’s goal and objectives have 
contributed to improving the capacity of actors to better manage marine and coastal resources in the 
project zone of influence. The government of Ghana and other key stakeholders will also use the results 
of the evaluation as a guide for future interventions. Lessons learned and best practices, from which 
stakeholders or beneficiaries, in achieving the results of the project, would also be insightful for decision 
makers during the design of future new projects.
2.0 SUMMARY INFORMATION 
|GHANA
72 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
The University of Cape Coast Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support 
(USAID/UCC FCMCBS) Project is a five-year project implemented by the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences (DFAS), of the University of Cape Coast (UCC). The project contributes to 
USAID/Ghana’s Country Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) Development Objective 2 
(DO.2): Sustainable and broadly shared economic growth; which contributes directly to the CDCS goal 
of “Accelerating Ghana’s transition towards established middle income status”. The project is also linked 
to the following Intermediate Results (IRs) and Sub-IRs under the CDCS DO.2: IR 2.1: increased 
competitiveness of major food chains; Sub-IR 2.1.1: Increased agricultural productivity; IR 2.4 increased 
government accountability responsiveness; and Sub-IR 2.4.2: Improved local community management of 
natural resources.
The project was planned to strengthen UCC's capacity through the DFAS in developing and providing 
quality and relevant education programs, practical research and advisory services that will support the 
management of fisheries and coastal resources on a sustainable basis to enhance Ghana’s social and 
economic development. The capacity building program is aimed to facilitate individual and organizational 
learning which builds social capital and trust, develops knowledge, skills and attitudes and when 
successful creates an organizational culture and a set of capabilities which will enable the University to 
set objectives, achieve results, solve problems, and create adaptive procedures which enable them to 
support national development. 
Project Identification data
Strategy/Project/Activity 
Name
USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building 
Support Project
USAID Office Economic Growth Office
Implementer Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (DFAS), School of Biological 
Sciences, College of Agriculture and Natural Sciences, University of Cape 
Coast (UCC)
Cooperative 
Agreement/Contract # 
641-A18-FY14- IL#007
Total Estimated Ceiling of 
the Evaluated 
Project/Activity(TEC) 
US$5.5 million
Life of Strategy, Project, or 
Activity 
October 24, 2014 – October 1, 2019
Active Geographic Regions Ghana
Development Objective(s) 
(DOs) 
DO2: Sustainable and Broadly Shared Economic Growth,
IR2.1: Increased competitiveness of major food chains
IR 2.4: Increased government accountability responsiveness
Required evaluation Yes
External or internal 
evaluation
External
3.0 BACKGROUND 
A. Description of the Problem and Context
The capacity of most developing nations to utilize their coastal and marine assets, while sustainably 
protecting them from degradation, is lacking. More especially, Ghana is faced with growing challenges in 
managing coastal and marine resources, such as the dramatic decline of fish stocks and the degradation 
of coastal resources. The overexploitation of fisheries at artisanal and industrial scales using 
unsustainable fishing methods, and the pollution of coastal ecosystems, are further concerns. Coastal 
73 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ecosystems, especially estuaries, lagoons and their associated wetlands, are becoming increasingly 
impacted by activities within their catchment areas, with deforestation, intensive agriculture, damming 
and irrigation all changing the nature of material fluxes (water, sediment, nutrients and pesticides). It is 
apparent that Ghana’s marine and coastal resources are being lost or damaged in ways that are 
diminishing biodiversity. This is attributable to many factors, including deficiency in monitoring and 
enforcement of regulations, lack of education, training, research, data gathering and analysis, and low 
government investments in capacity building for effective management. The lack of adequate human 
resource capacity, good governance and well-functioning systems impede natural resource management 
in Ghana. 
The development of adequate human capacity through quality education programs and research is a 
major challenge for developing countries. Government-supported educational and research institutions 
in Ghana are faced with various challenges including poor and inadequate infrastructure, lack of training 
materials as well as inadequate equipment. There are also poor incentive packages for staff and students 
to conduct research and undertake extension and outreach activities.
USAID/Ghana’s technical and financial support is aimed at building capacity for developing and providing 
quality and relevant education programs, practical research and advisory services that will support the 
management of fisheries and coastal resources on a sustainable basis to enhance nation's social and 
economic development. USAID/Ghana will assist improving research capability by supporting 
environments that encourage people to use research. This means improving researchers’ skills, as well 
as their access to research information and resources. It means supporting researchers in playing a more 
regular and effective role in policy-making. It also means paying special attention where there are skills 
gaps for example in social sciences.
The project’s contribution to sustainable management of coastal and marine resources is consistent with 
the country’s goal of sustained economic growth and poverty reduction. Additionally, the project 
contributes to Millennium Development Goal 7 on environmental sustainability.
B. Description of the Intervention to be evaluated and Theory of Change
The USAID/UCC FCMCBS project is designed to support in strengthening UCC's capacity in developing 
and providing quality and relevant education programs, practical research and advisory services to 
students and other relevant stakeholders. These are expected to support and sustainably manage the 
country’s fisheries and coastal resources for a robust social and economic development. 
This capacity building program is aimed to facilitate individual and organizational learning which builds 
social capital and trust, develops knowledge, skills and attitudes and when successful, creates an 
organizational culture and a set of capabilities which will enable the university to set objectives, achieve 
results, solve problems, and create adaptive procedures which enable them to support national 
development.
The overarching goal of USAID/Ghana's Fisheries and Coastal Management projects is to "Improve 
sustainable management of Ghana's marine and coastal resources". The goal of the project will be 
achieved by the attainment of the following objectives and intermediate results:
1. Strengthened capacity for sustainable fisheries and coastal resource management (project
purpose)
2. Organizational and human capacity strengthened (sub-purpose 1):
a. Improved infrastructure (output 1.1); and
b. Increased technical and scientific knowledge (output 1.2)
74 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
3. Increased information and knowledge for natural resource management (sub-purpose 2):
a. Increased marine and coastal research and assessments (Output 2.1); and
b. Communication, extension and outreach improved (Output 2.2)
The above intermediate results will be attained through the implementation of the following key 
activities:
1. Project Output1.1: Improved Infrastructure
a. Activity 1.1.1: Renovated and Equipped the Fisheries and Aquatic Science Research 
Laboratory
b. Activity 1.1.2: Refurbished and Equipped office/Lecture/Computer rooms and Library
2. Project Output 1.2: Increased Capacity in Technical and Scientific Knowledge
a. Activity 1.2.1: Academic and Technical Staff Capacity Strengthened
b. Activity 1.2.2: Operationalized Center for Coastal Management 
c. Activity 1.2.3: Postgraduate (M. Phil & PhD) Training Program supported and Research 
grants in fisheries and management of coastal resources
3. Project Output 2.1: Increased marine and coastal Research and Resource Assessments
a. Activity 2.1.1: Natural Resource or Fisheries Stock Assessments conducted
b. Activity 2.1.2: Research and Assessment on Marine Fisheries Governance Issues conducted 
c. Activity 2.1.3: Research on Fish and Shellfish of Commercial Value conducted
d. Activity 2.1.4: Analysis of Value Chains of Fish Trade conducted
e. Activity 2.1.5: Biodiversity and Health of Coastal Ecosystems monitored
f. Activity 2.1.6: Marine and Coastal Fisheries Database developed
4. Project Output 2.2: Improved Communication, Extension and Outreach
a. Activity 2.2.1: Relevant materials developed and training conducted on Integrated Coastal 
and Fisheries Management, Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation, Application of 
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and its associated geo-databases
The UCC FCM-CBS project is linked to two other USAID/Ghana funded projects: The Sustainable 
Fisheries Management Project (SFMP) and the recently closed Coastal Sustainable Landscape Project 
(CSLP), both of which were expected to work in concert with the UCC FCM-CBS project to improve 
sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal resources. Specifically, the SFMP was purposed 
to reduce the over exploitation of marine fish resources by undertaking the following:
1. Strengthening the enabling environment for decentralized fisheries and coastal governance;
2. Increase the use of science and applied research to inform decision-making, law enforcement 
and the implementation of management plans;
3. Heighten the public’s awareness of trends, challenges and successes in marine resources 
management and stronger demand for sustainable use and conservation; and 
4. Improve management of marine resources to reduce over-exploitation, to conserve biodiversity 
and to provide other benefits.
The CSLP, on the other hand, was procured to strengthen capacity for low emissions development 
through improved coastal forest landscape management. The medium-term outcomes were: 
1. Strengthened multi-stakeholder platforms for natural resource and environmental management;
2. Improved community based NRM and Protected Area management capacity in priority areas; 
75 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
3. Enhanced application of agroforestry and reforestation techniques in priority degraded lands; 
and 
4. Strengthened enabling environment for payment for ecosystem services including REDD+ 
opportunities
The project originally had three (3) intermediate results, which covered 1) capacity building; 2) research; 
and 3) extension. However, during project implementation, in December, 2015, the project focused on 
only two intermediate results by merging the expected results in research and extension. With approval 
from USAID/Ghana, the project subsequently revised its results framework and performance indicators 
to align with the new intermediate results. In so doing, the number of indicators reduced from 28 to 24, 
majority of which are State-F Standard Program indicators. These indicators measure key “output” and 
“outcomes” in the project’s results framework and revised “theory of change.”
The FCMCBS project was expected to collaborate with two other USAID/GHANA funded projects to 
increase the core capacity of the DFAS at the UCC to collaborate with its principal government and 
non-governmental partners
This revised theory of change argues that IF the UCC FCMBS project activities are successful in:
• Strengthening the organization and human capacity of the DFAS by 
- investing in laboratories, computer rooms and the library;
- Increasing the technical and scientific knowledge of research staff, lecturers, technicians and 
students to carry out research and provide training in fisheries and coastal management; 
and;
• Increasing information and knowledge for natural resource management by 
- Increasing the number of and quality of marine and coastal research and assessments;
- Improving communication, extension and outreach to local communities. 
THEN it will 
Improve sustainable management of Ghana's marine and coastal resources, which will contribute to 
achieving the USAID/Ghana’s CDCS DO.2: Sustainable and broadly shared economic growth.
Project target areas and target beneficiaries 
At the beginning of the project, the target coastal regions of influence focused on Central and Western 
regions of Ghana. However, in the course of implementation the focal areas were expanded to include 
Greater Accra and Volta regions. For instance, participants for the short courses were attracted from 
the four coastal regions with emphasis on the coastal districts.
S/N Region District
1 Central Abura/Asebu/Kwamankese
2 Central Cape Coast Metro
3 Central Komenda Edna Eguafo Abirem
4 Central Ekumfi
5 Central Effutu Municipal
6 Central Gomoa West
7 Central Gomoa East
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8 Central Mfantsiman Municipal
9 Central Upper Denkyira East Municipal
10 Volta Ketu South Municipal
11 Volta Keta Municipal
12 Volta Ho Municipal
13 Volta Nkwanta North
14 Volta Hohoe Municipal
15 Volta South Tongu
16 Western Ahanta West
17 Western Jomoro
18 Western Shama
19 Western Nzema East Municipal
20 Western Gomoa West
21 Western Ellembele
22 Western Sekondi-Takoradi Metro
23 Greater Accra Kpone Katamanso
24 Greater Accra Ledzokuku-Krowor Municipal
25 Greater Accra Accra Metro
26 Greater Accra Dangme East
27 Greater Accra Tema Metro
28 Greater Accra Ada East 
29 Greater Accra Ada West
30 Greater Accra Ningo Prampram
31 Greater Accra Ayawaso West District
32 Greater Accra Ga South Municipal
33 Greater Accra La Dade-Kotopon Municipal
77 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
A map of focal areas of project interventions
TARGET BENEFICIARIES
Beneficiary Group Number
Government Agencies 74
Academia and Research Institutions 363
Local communities, CBOs and resources users 210
Media 100
NGO and Development Partners 53
Total Number of Beneficiaries 800
4.0 EVALUATION QUESTIONS 
In order to guide the end line evaluation, the following critical questions will be answered:
1. To what extent has the UCC FCM-CBS Project achieved its intended goal and objectives as 
defined by the results framework? 
a. Has organizational and human capacity been strengthened as a result of improved 
infrastructure and increased technical and scientific knowledge?
b. Have efforts to increase marine and coastal research and assessment, and improved 
communication, extension and outreach resulted in increased information and knowledge 
for natural resource management?
78 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
c. Has the implementation of livelihood activities resulted in increased opportunities for 
income generation amongst the fisher families, and has it impacted the target communities? 
2. What unintended outcomes has the UCC FCM-CBS Project’s capacity strengthening activities 
achieved relevant to improving sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal 
resources? 
3. To what extent has the UCC FCM-CBS Project collaborated with other USAID-funded projects 
such as CSLP and SFMP, and GoG Partners, such as the MoFAD, other donor projects and 
private sector to achieve the overall purpose of strengthening capacity for sustainable fisheries 
and coastal resources management?
4. To what extent has the project addressed the gender issues related to capacity building among 
the different groups of beneficiaries and what the impact has been?
5. To what extent are the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project capacity strengthening interventions 
likely to continue after USG support?
a. a. Is stakeholder buy-in likely to continue or be increased after the current project expires? 
b. b. What are the lessons learned and best practices; and from which stakeholders or 
beneficiaries, in achieving results?
6. Which USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project capacity strengthening activities are the most and least 
effective at improving sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal resources?
5.0 EVALUATION DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY
A cross sectional design is proposed for the implementation of the final evaluation for the project. This 
will help the project collect information at a point in time to reflect the study population. 
In the design, the consultant is expected to adopt suitable systematic data collection techniques to avoid 
bias of any form and collect adequate and quality data. Consultant should consider the mixed methods, 
thus, using both the quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection and analysis. 
Consultants will be expected to share data collection design and tools with the USAID/UCC FCMCBS 
Project, METTS II Project and USAID/Ghana for review and feedback and/or discussion, with sufficient 
time, before they are applied in the field. The Consultants are also expected to ensure that the 
evaluation method though not limited to, should include the below:
A. Review of existing Documentation: Project documents that should be reviewed may include but not 
limited to the Project Appraisal Document, the project technical proposal, the baseline report, 
the annual and quarterly project reports, annual work plans, and any other assessment reports 
related to the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project. 
B. Key Informant Interviews: Consultants should interact with key partners and stakeholders of the 
project in the form of key informant interviews. These key partners and stakeholders include 
USAID/Ghana implementing partners (SFMP and CSLP), some governmental institutions, some 
private sector partners and some beneficiaries.
C. Survey of Beneficiaries: Consultants are supposed to consider all who have benefitted from the 
project. This includes students who enrolled under the project, staff of the Department of 
Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, Centre for Coastal Management and all others who have 
benefitted from the project.
D. Personal Observation: The evaluation team is expected to visit selected physical investments 
supported by the project and document how they are functioning and benefiting the beneficiary 
institutions.
79 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
6.0 DELIVERABLES AND REPORTING REQUIREMENTS 
1. Evaluation Work plan:
Within a two (2) weeks of the award of the contract, the lead evaluator shall complete and present a 
draft work plan for the evaluation to the Agreement Officer’s Representative (AOR) at USAID/Ghana, 
Chief of Operations (CoO) at METSS II and the Project Manager of the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project 
for approval. 
The evaluation work plan will comprise of an evaluation design which will include: Detailed evaluation 
design matrix that links the Evaluation Questions from the SOW to data sources, methods, and the data 
analysis plan; Draft questionnaires and other data collection instruments; List of potential interviewees 
and sites to be visited and proposed selection criteria and/or sampling plan (must include sampling 
methodology and methods, including a justification of sample size and any applicable calculations); and 
Limitations to the evaluation design. 
The evaluation work plan will also include
1. Draft schedule and logistical arrangements;
2. Members of the evaluation team, delineated by roles and responsibilities;
3. Evaluation milestones; 
4. Anticipated schedule of evaluation team data collection efforts;
5. Locations and dates for piloting data collection efforts, if applicable;
6. Proposed evaluation methodology including selection criteria for comparison groups, if 
applicable. 
The data analysis plan should clearly describe the evaluation team’s approach for analyzing quantitative 
and qualitative data (as applicable), including proposed sample sizes, specific data analysis tools, and any 
software proposed to be used, with an explanation of how/why these selections will be useful in 
answering the evaluation questions for this task. Gender, geographic, and role (beneficiary, implementer, 
government official, NGO, etc.) disaggregation must be included in the data analysis where applicable. 
The consultant must receive approval of work plan before beginning field work.
2. In-briefing: 
Within two (2) working days after submitting the draft evaluation work plan, or in the instance where 
the evaluators are not in-country, within two days of arrival in Accra, the evaluation team will meet with 
the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project staff, METSS II Project and Economic Growth Office for 
introductions and to discuss the team’s understanding of the assignment, initial assumptions, evaluation 
questions, methodology, and work plan, and/or to adjust the SOW, if necessary.
3. Mid-term Briefing and Interim Meetings
The evaluation team is expected to hold a mid-term briefing with USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project staff, 
METSS II Project and/or Economic Growth Office on the status of the evaluation, including potential 
challenges and emerging opportunities. The team will also provide the evaluation METSS II Project Chief 
of Operation with periodic briefings and feedback on the team’s findings, as agreed upon during the in￾briefing. If desired or necessary, weekly briefings by phone can be arranged. 
4. Final Exit Briefing:
The evaluation team is expected to hold a final exit briefing to discuss the status of data collection and 
preliminary findings. This presentation will be scheduled as agreed upon during the in-briefing. The 
evaluation team is expected to hold a presentation either in person, or by virtual means to discuss the 
80 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
summary of findings and conclusions with USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project staff, METSS II Project and/or 
Economic Growth Office. The evaluation team will consider comments and make necessary revisions.
5. Draft Evaluation Report: 
The draft evaluation report should be consistent with the guidance provided in Section IX, Final Report 
Format dub-section. The report will address each of the questions identified in Section IV of the SOW 
and any other issues, the team considers to have a bearing on the objectives of the evaluation. Any such 
issues can be included in the report only after consultation with METSS II Project. The submission date 
for the draft evaluation report will be determined in the evaluation work plan. Once the initial draft 
evaluation report is submitted, USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project staff, METSS II Project and USAID/Ghana 
will have ten (10) working days in which to review and comment on the initial draft, and submit the 
consolidated comments to the evaluation team. The evaluation team will then submit a revised final draft 
report within five (5) working days, and again the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project staff, METSS II Project 
office and USAID/Ghana will review and send comments on this final draft report within ten (10) 
working days of its submission.
6. Final Evaluation Report
The evaluation team will be asked to take no more than three (3) business days to respond and/or 
incorporate the final comments from contributors (USAID/Ghana, METSS II Project and/or USAID/UCC 
FCMCBS Project Staff). 
7.0 EVALUATION TEAM COMPOSITION
The evaluation team will consist of a team leader and two other experts. A representative from the 
USAID/Ghana Mission and METSS II Project may be delegated to work full-time with the evaluation 
team or to participate in selected evaluation activities.
Senior Technical Consultant (Lead): 
1. The consultant must be someone with extensive experience as team leader of mid-term and 
final evaluations of USAID funded projects and the concept of “participatory” assessment 
processes that elicit high level monitoring and evaluation.
2. Specialist should have a postgraduate degree in Marine or Fisheries Science, or an applicable 
social science field. S/he should have at least 10 years’ senior level experience working in 
fisheries and aquaculture sector in a developing country. 
3. S/he should have extensive experience in project management, institutional capacity building 
programs, conducting both qualitative and quantitative evaluations/ assessments and strong 
familiarity with agricultural finance. Excellent oral and written skills are required. 
4. The Team Leader should also have experience in leading evaluation teams and preparing high 
quality documents. The Team Leader will take specific responsibility for assessing and analyzing 
the project’s progress towards achieving its targets, factors for such performance, 
benefits/impact of the strategies, and compare with other possible options. S/he will also suggest 
ways of improving the present performance, if any. 
5. S/he will provide leadership for the team, finalize the evaluation design, coordinate activities, 
arrange periodic meetings, consolidate individual input from team members, and coordinate the 
process of assembling the final findings and recommendations into a high quality document. S/he 
will write the final report. S/he will also lead the preparation and presentation of the key 
evaluation findings and recommendations to the USAID/Ghana team and other major partners. 
6. Experience with data collection procedures, surveys, and analysis of data using statistical analysis 
tools.
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7. This person should also have good interpersonal and diplomatic skills and demonstrated 
expertise in gender in order to ensure that the USAID/FtF protocols for considering gender in 
an assessment as are met.
Senior Technical Writing Consultant and Evaluation Management Consultant (Co-Lead): 
The senor technical writing and evaluation management consultant should be someone with at least 10 
years’ experience in managing or co-managing participatory assessment exercise and working with 
development and food security professionals to improve their skills for systematic write up of reports 
and bulletins that comply with US government M&E quality standards. The specialist must have a 
minimum of a masters in a relevant technical areas and have good organizational and pedagogical skills as 
well as extensive experience in FTF and USAID guidelines and standards including 508 compliance. 
He/she will have the role of ensuring that all the written deliverables comply with USAID/FTF rules and 
regulations and USAID/Ghana expectations. He/She will play a critical role in determining a speedy 
and efficient process for document turnaround.
Senior Marine and Fisheries Specialist. Specialist should have a post graduate degree in Marine or 
Fisheries Science, or an applicable social science field and have firsthand familiarity with the capacity 
building issues that the DFAS is focusing on. S/he should have at least 10 years’ senior level experience 
working in fisheries and aquaculture sector in Ghana. This individual will ensure that the most important 
technical capacity issues and institutional issues that were targeted by the project are measured 
appropriately in the interviews and that the recommendations and “lessons learned” are realistic.
The work plan must provide information about evaluation team members, including their curricula vitae, 
and explain how they meet the requirements in the evaluation SOW. Submissions of writing samples or 
links to past evaluation reports and related deliverables composed by proposed team members are 
highly desirable. All team members must provide to USAID/Ghana a signed statement attesting to a lack 
of conflict of interest or describing an existing conflict of interest relative to the project or activity being 
evaluated (i.e., a conflict of interest form). 
8.0 EVALUATION SCHEDULE 
A. Period of Performance
Work is to be carried out over a period of approximately Twelve (12) weeks, beginning on or about 
August 1, 2019 with field work and draft report completed September 30, 2019 and final report and 
close out concluding October 30, 2019.
The below evaluation schedule is illustrative and will be updated in collaboration with USAID prior to 
finalization of the work plan 
Performance Evaluation Schedule
Timing (Anticipated 
submission date)
Anticipated 
Duration (Days)
Proposed Activities
August 1, 2019 Evaluation contract awarded to Consultants
August 8, 2019 5 Consultants prepare and submit a detailed evaluation work plan 
to METSS II Project
August 12, 2019 1
Evaluation team (Consultants) conducts in-brief with METSS II,
USAID and USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project on evaluation work
plan
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August 16, 2019 5 USAID, METSS II and USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project review 
evaluation work plan and submit feedback to evaluation team
August 19, 2019 2 Evaluation team integrates comments into work plan and 
submits final document to METSS II Project USAID and 
USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project
August 23, 2019 3 Evaluation team completes pre-testing of evaluation
instruments/tools
August 30, 2019 5 Evaluation team trains evaluation/survey enumerators
September 16, 2019 15 Collect data from evaluation respondents in the project target
areas
September 23, 2019 6 Data Analysis
October 4, 2019 10 Write draft report and submit preliminary findings
October 11, 2019 5 USAID, METSS II and USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project review 
evaluation draft report and submit feedback to evaluation team
October 18, 2019 3 Evaluation team incorporates comments and prepare final
evaluation report
October 30, 2019 3 Evaluation team Leader submits formatted Final Evaluation 
Report
9.0 FINAL REPORT FORMAT
The evaluation final report should include an abstract; executive summary; evaluation purpose; 
introduction; background of the project context and project being evaluated; the evaluation questions; 
the methodology; the limitations to the evaluation; key findings, conclusions, and recommendations; and 
lessons learned (if applicable).
The evaluation report should be easily understood and should identify key points clearly, distinctly, and 
succinctly. The findings should be presented as analyzed facts, evidence, and data and not based on 
anecdotes, hearsay, or simply the compilation of people’s opinions. 
The Executive Summary should be 2-5 pages in length and present a concise and accurate statement of 
the most critical elements of the report. It should summarize key points (purpose and background, 
evaluation questions, methods, findings, conclusions, recommendations and lessons learnt). 
The report should provide a brief Background information, which should include country and/or 
sector context; specific problem or opportunity the intervention addresses; and the development 
hypothesis, theory of change, or simply how the intervention addresses the problem. Describe the 
specific strategy, project, activity, or intervention to be evaluated including (if available) award numbers, 
award dates, funding levels, and implementing partners. 
The Evaluation Purpose and Questions should state the purpose of, audience for, and anticipated 
use(s) of the evaluation. Clearly state the evaluation questions in this section. 
Explain the evaluation or survey Methodology in detail and clearly state sources of information. Disclose 
limitations to the evaluation, especially, those associated with the methodology (e.g. selection bias, recall 
bias, unobservable differences between comparator groups, etc.).
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NOTE: A summary of methodology can be included in the body of the report, with the full description 
provided as an annex.
Findings, Conclusions, and Recommendations: Address all evaluation questions in this Statement 
of Work (SOW) or document why some evaluation questions and/or comments from METSS II Project 
or USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project or USAID/Ghana have not been addressed for approval.
If evaluation findings assess person-level outcomes, they should also be separately assessed for both 
males and females.
Findings and conclusions should be specific, concise, and supported by strong quantitative or qualitative 
evidence. If recommendations are included, separate them from findings and conclusions. 
Recommendations should be supported with specific findings and should be action-oriented, practical 
and specific.
Limitations to the evaluation shall be disclosed in the report, with particular attention to the limitations 
associated with the evaluation methods (e.g., in sampling; data availability; measurement; analysis; any 
potential bias such as sampling/selection, measurement, interviewer, response, etc.) and their 
implications for conclusions drawn from the evaluation findings.
Annexes to the report must include: 
• Evaluation SOW (updated, not the original, if there were any modifications);
• Evaluation methods;
• All data collection and analysis tools used in conducting the evaluation, such as questionnaires, 
checklists, and discussion guides;
• All sources of information or data, identified and listed; 
• Statements of difference regarding significant unresolved differences of opinion by funders, 
implementers, and/or members of the evaluation team, if applicable;
• Signed disclosure of conflict of interest forms for all evaluation team members, either attesting 
to a lack of or describing existing conflicts of interest; and
• Summary information about evaluation team members, including qualifications, experience, and 
role on the team.
The final version of the evaluation report will be submitted to USAID/Ghana and METSS II Project in 
hard copy as well as electronically. The report format should be restricted to Microsoft products and 
12- point Times New Roman font type should be used throughout the body of the report, with page 
margins 1” top/bottom and left/right. 
The main report should not exceed 30 pages, excluding the executive summary, references and annexes.
The evaluation team leader shall incorporate METSS II Project, USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project, and 
USAID/Ghana’s comments and submit the final report to USAID in electronic format (Microsoft Word) 
as well as printed and bound copies (Three copies in English) no later than six working days of the 
receipt of the comments.
10.0 CRITERIA TO ENSURE THE QUALITY OF THE EVALUATION REPORT
The draft and final evaluation reports will be evaluated against the following criteria to ensure quality.
• Evaluation reports should represent a thoughtful, well-researched, and well-organized effort to 
objectively evaluate the project; 
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• Evaluation reports should be readily understood and should identify key points clearly, distinctly, 
and succinctly; 
• The Executive Summary should present a concise and accurate statement of the most critical 
elements of the report;
• Evaluation reports should adequately address all evaluation questions included in the SOW, or 
the evaluation questions subsequently revised and documented in consultation and agreement 
with USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project Staff, METSS II Project, USAID/Ghana;
• Evaluation methodology should be explained in detail and sources of information or data 
properly identified; 
• Limitations to the evaluation should be disclosed in the report, with particular attention to the 
limitations associated with the evaluation methodology (selection bias, recall bias, unobservable 
differences between comparator groups, etc.);
• Evaluation findings should be presented as analyzed facts, evidence, and data and not based on 
anecdotes, hearsay, or simply the compilation of people’s opinions; 
• Conclusions should be specific, concise, and include an assessment of quality and strength of 
evidence to support them supported by strong quantitative and/or qualitative evidence;
• If evaluation findings assess person-level outcomes or impact, they should also be separately 
assessed for both males and females; and 
• If recommendations are included, they should be supported by a specific set of findings and 
should be action-oriented, practical, and specific. 
EVALUATION MANAGEMENT 
Logistical Support 
The USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project will support with necessary logistical arrangements. The project
together with METSS II will support the evaluation team identify key documents, and arrange for 
meetings with key stakeholders. The evaluation team is responsible for arranging other meetings as 
identified during the course of the evaluation and may request support from USAID/UCC FCMCBS 
Project and METSS II project. In all these arrangements the USAID/Ghana USAID/UCC FCMCBS 
Project AOR and EG Office M&E Specialist should be notified prior to each of these meetings.
The consultants should make arrangements for accommodation, vehicles needed for site visits, and 
meetings, and/or contact METSS II Project to make the arrangements with reasonable notice, if 
necessary.
However, the evaluation team members will be required to make their own payments for lodging, meals 
and incidental expenses. USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project and/or the METSS II Project will make available 
their conference room or another convenient location upon request of the evaluation team as work 
space. The evaluation team is, however, expected to use their own computers.
Technical Direction
Technical direction during the performance of the evaluation contract will be provided by the METSS II 
projects’ Chief of Operations (CoO) and USAID/Ghana AOR, who will be the point of contact for the 
Consultant’s Evaluation Team during performance. 
The AOR, on behalf of the Agreement Officer (AO), is the only USG official authorized to make changes 
to the terms and conditions of the evaluation contract. In the event that the Consultant believes that it
is required to perform activities outside the evaluation contract, they must immediately contact/inform 
85 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
the AOR before performing these tasks. The Consultant will not be paid any amount in excess of the 
evaluation budget set forth in the evaluation contract.
CRITERIA EVALUATING THE TECHNICAL PROPOSAL
Technical proposals will be evaluated based on the criteria outlined below.
Technical Evaluation Criteria Points
Technical Approach 50
Personnel 50
Total Possible Evaluation Point 100
Applicants/Consultants should note that these criteria and sub-criteria serve: (a) as the standard against 
which the proposal will be evaluated, and (b) to identify the significant matters that Applicant should 
address in their proposal. The specific evaluation criteria are as follows:
Technical Approach – (50 points)
The technical approach should address the following sub-criteria which will be considered in the 
evaluation of the proposal: 
• A clear strategy to address the evaluation questions, and achieve the evaluation requirements.
• Degree or extent to which the Applicant’s technical approach strategy, methodology and 
activities has the potential to accomplish the tasks within the implementation period.
• Clear articulation of anticipated challenges and description of how they will be addressed.
• An illustrative work plan with timeframes and durations for mobilizing staff, field work, data 
analysis, and reporting. Work plan should demonstrate logical linkages between task areas and 
timeframes that combines a strong balance of rigor and reflection.
Personnel (50 points)
Clear, concise and defined proposed key personnel, their role, responsibility, qualification and relevant 
experience. Include CVs of proposed key personnel, illustrating experience in similar assignments, and 
references. Refer to Section VII for the required qualification and experience of the required team 
members for the evaluation.
Cost Proposal Evaluation
Contract award will be made on a best value basis, where all non-cost (technical) factors will be 
significantly more important than cost. The consultants should have the structure that will allow it to 
provide the best value and greatest results at the lowest cost. The price proposal of the contract period 
shall be evaluated in terms of reasonableness and realism to determine the appropriate cost for the 
work, including the firm’s understanding of the work, and their ability to perform the work.
LIST OF ANNEXES
During the evaluation and upon request, the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project, Economic Growth Office in 
USAID/Ghana and/or METSS II Project will avail to the contractor the following documents:
1. University of Cape Coast Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support 
(USAID/UCC FCMCBS) Project Description document;
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2. USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project M&E Plan
3. USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project baseline report
4. USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project Annual and Quarterly Reports – USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project
5. List of districts and communities
6. List of beneficiaries and stakeholders
7. Case studies and internal evaluation documents developed by project implementers; and
8. Other special studies undertaken by the USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project and USAID/Monitoring, 
Evaluation and Technical Support Services (METSS) as part of project implementation. 
ANNEX
USAID/UCC FCMCBS Project Results Framework
KRA 1.2: Increased 
technical and scientific 
knowledge
KRA 1.1: Improved 
Infrastructure
KRA 2.2: Communication, 
extension and outreach 
improved
KRA 2.1: Increased marine 
and coastal research and 
assessments
Overall Goal: Improved sustainable management of Ghana’s marine and coastal resources
Ref: EG RF – IR 2.4.2 
FCMCBSP Purpose: Strengthened capacity for 
sustainable fisheries and coastal resources 
management
PIR 1: Organizational and 
human capacity 
strengthened
PIR 2: Increased 
information and 
knowledge for natural 
resource management
Sustainable Fisheries 
Management 
Project
Coastal Sustainable 
Landscapes Project
Assumptions: Absence of disruptions in the academic calendar, stable prices of items to be purchased (vehicles, 
furniture, laboratory equipment)
DO 2 Goal: Sustainable and broadly shared economic growth
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List of Indicators
No. Results Area Indicator Title Level of Disaggregation
IR 1: Improved Agricultural 
Productivity Sub-IR1.1: Enhanced 
human and institutional capacity 
development for increased 
sustainable agricultural sector 
productivity
4.5.2(6): Number of individuals who 
have received USG supported long￾term agricultural sector 
productivity or food security 
training
Sex: Male, Female
Duration: New, Continuing
IR 1: Improved Agricultural 
Productivity Sub-IR1.1: Enhanced 
human and institutional capacity 
development for increased 
sustainable agricultural sector 
productivity
4.5.2(7): Number of individuals who 
have received USG supported 
short-term agricultural sector 
productivity or food security 
training
Type of individual
Sex: Male, Female
4.5.2(27): Number of members of 
producer organizations and 
community based organizations 
receiving USG assistance
4.5.2(13): Number of rural 
households benefiting directly from 
USG interventions
IR 1: Improved Agricultural 
Productivity Sub-IR1.2: Enhanced 
Technology Development, 
Dissemination, Management and 
Innovation
4.5.2(2): Number of hectares under 
improved technologies or 
management practices as a result of 
USG assistance 
Type of Technology
Sex: Male, Female, Joint, 
Association-applied
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ANNEX III. PERFORMANCE INDICATOR 
TRACKING TABLE
No. Indicator Baseline Life of Project 
target
Performance 
achieved 
(actual)
Performance 
achieved in (%)
On target? 
Yes/No
1
Quantities and/or sizes of fish landed 
by selected canoe fishermen in the 
Central and Western Regions of 
Ghana
- - - - -
Comments: Periodic stock assessment surveys conducted provide information and data for this custom indicator. The nature of the indicator made it difficult to 
set baselines, annual targets and performance achieved in a particular reporting period which means results shown by this indicator could only be descriptive. The 
fish stock assessment was concluded by the project in FY 2017 and data collection supported by postgraduate students. Results indicated that quantities of fish 
landed by canoe fishermen have shown a gradual decline since 1986 mainly due to increase in fishing effort during the period. The assessments also showed that 
there is growth overfishing which is confirmed by lower modal sizes of fish landed. 
2 Fishing Mortality at MSY (Fmsy) 0.74 - - - -
Comments: This is a custom indicator of the USAID/Ghana Sustainable Fisheries Management Project (SFMP) that was only tracked by the USAID/UCC Fisheries 
and Coastal Management Capacity Building Project. In 2014, the SFMP estimated Fishing Mortality at MSY (Fmsy) to be 0.74 (as baseline) which was higher than the 
preferred Fishing Mortality at MSY (Fmsy) of 0.40. In FY 2017, the SFMP reported Fishing Mortality at MSY (Fmsy) to be 0.30 which indicates an increase in fishing 
mortality and a severe decline in population size. Current fishing effort is well beyond the level of sustainability for the small pelagic stocks.
3 Biomass to produce MSY (Bmsy) 212,726 - - - -
Comments: This is also a custom indicator of the USAID/Ghana Sustainable Fisheries Management Project (SFMP) that was only tracked by the USAID/UCC 
Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Project. In 2014, the SFMP estimated Biomass to produce MSY (Bmsy) as 182,726 tonnes, which was less than 
the preferred Biomass to produce MSY (Bmsy) of 310,476 tonnes. In FY 2017, the SFMP reported Biomass to produce MSY (Bmsy) as 30,000 tonnes. Current 
estimated biomass is much lower than those estimated in 2014. This suggests diminishing economic returns. 
4
Number of hectares of biological 
significance and/or natural resources 
under improved natural resource 
management as a result of USG 
assistance
0 6.9 6.9 100 % Yes
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No. Indicator Baseline Life of Project 
target
Performance 
achieved 
(actual)
Performance 
achieved in (%)
On target? 
Yes/No
Comments: In Year 3, the project concluded research on the ecological conditions and the overall health status of the Awiane lagoon at Half Assini in the Western 
Region in order to acquire a more comprehensive baseline data on the lagoon for improved management.
5
Number of hectares in areas of 
biological significance and/or natural 
resource showing improved 
biophysical conditions as a result of 
USG assistance 
0 6.9 0 0 No
Comments: Following the scientific outcome of research conducted on the lagoon by the project, the assembly has shown commitment in improving the 
biophysical conditions by collaborating with the local community to improve the sanitary conditions around the lagoon. Targets were not achieved due to political 
stalemate at the local district assembly in relation to the appointment of the district chief executive. This forestalled progress on the improved management for the 
lagoon in terms of the removal of solid waste and relocation of animal farms close to the lagoon. However, the project is in discussion with the district assembly to 
provide a skip to community bordering the lagoon to improve sanitary conditions.
6
Number of training and capacity 
building activities conducted with USG 
assistance
0 40 30 75 No
Comments: Since the inception of the project, 30 training sessions have been organized. The target was not achieved due to limited funding in FY 2018
7
Number of people receiving USG 
supported training in natural 
resources management and/or 
biodiversity conservation
0 250 225 90 No
Comments: Number of beneficiaries include resource users, beneficiaries of supplementary livelihood activities, and members of community-based organizations.
8
Number of person hours of training in 
natural resources management and/or 
biodiversity conservation supported 
by USG assistance 
0 15000 16728 111.52 Yes
Comments: This is a culmination of “person hours” of all training sessions organized since the inception of the project. Additionally, 7,200 hours was accrued 
from 20 MPhil students who participated in lectures and seminars for 26 weeks (two semesters) for conservatively three hours per day.
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No. Indicator Baseline Life of Project 
target
Performance 
achieved 
(actual)
Performance 
achieved in (%)
On target? 
Yes/No
9
Number of individuals who have 
received USG supported long-term 
agricultural sector productivity or 
food security training
0 40 36 90 No
Comments: Thirty-six (36) students (13 males and 23 females) received USG supported long-term agricultural sector productivity or food security training. One 
MPhil student was withdrawn in FY 2017 due to falsification of research data; One PhD student died in FY 2019 while pursuing an extra-curricular activity. Thirty￾four (34) FCMCBSP-sponsored students are expected to successfully graduate by August 2020.
10
Number of individuals who have 
received USG supported short-term 
agricultural sector productivity or 
food security training
0 250 266 106.4 Yes
Comments: Data for this indicator was largely addressed by the short course trainings organized in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Coastal Adaptation to 
Climate Change, Fisheries Management and Integrated Coastal Zone Management.
11
Number of food security private 
enterprises (for profit), producers 
organizations, water users 
associations, women's groups, trade 
and business associations, and 
community-based organizations 
(CBOs) receiving USG assistance
0 10 18 180 Yes
Comments: 
12
Number of private enterprises (for 
profit), producers organizations, water 
users associations, women's groups, 
trade and business associations, and 
community-based organizations 
(CBOs) that applied new technologies 
or management practices as a result of 
USG assistance
0 10 5 50 No
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No. Indicator Baseline Life of Project 
target
Performance 
achieved 
(actual)
Performance 
achieved in (%)
On target? 
Yes/No
Comments: At the end of the project, five (5) Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) that received technical assistance in supplementary livelihood activities 
applied new management practices in beekeeping, snail farming and oyster culture.
13
Number of members of producer 
organizations and community based 
organizations receiving USG assistance
0 200 196 98 No
Comments: One-hundred and ninety-six (196) members in total belonging to the five (5) Community-Based Fisheries Management Groups (CBFMGs) formed in 4 
selected fishing communities received technical assistance in supplementary livelihoods activities (snail farming, bee-keeping and oyster culture) by the project during 
the project implementation period.
14
Number of farmers and others who 
have applied new technologies or 
management practices as a result of 
USG assistance
0 200 87 43.5 No
Comments: Members of 4 Community-Based Fisheries Management Groups (CBFMGs) formed in 4 selected fishing communities applied new management 
practices in snail farming and beekeeping. Data for the indicator was collected at the inception phase of the livelihood activities in these communities. The target 
was not achieved due to suspension of the activity because of limited funding during FY 2018.
15 Number of rural households benefiting 
directly from USG interventions
0 200 196 98 No
Comments: One-hundred and ninety-six (196) members in total belonging to the four (4) Community-Based Fisheries Management Groups (CBFMGs) formed in 
4 selected fishing communities received technical assistance in supplementary livelihoods activities (snail farming and bee-keeping) by the project during the project 
implementation period.
16
Score, in percent, of combined key 
areas of organization capacity amongst 
USG direct and indirect local 
implementing partners
0 95 92.67 97.55 No
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No. Indicator Baseline Life of Project 
target
Performance 
achieved 
(actual)
Performance 
achieved in (%)
On target? 
Yes/No
Comments: Africa Lead conducted an Organizational Capacity Assessment for DFAS and CCM. The assessment covered 8 major areas; 1) Governance 2) 
Administration 3) Human Resources 4) Financial Management 5) Organizational Management 6) Program Management 7) Network Capacities and 8) Policy Analysis 
and Advocacy and arrived at a total score of 80.33% as the combined key areas of organization capacity. This assessment was conducted in FY 2016. In FY 2019, the 
final assessment was conducted to measure the progress of DFAS and CCM in all 8 areas. The result for the final OCA was 92.67 % as against 80.33 % from the 
beginning of the project.
17
Number of beneficiaries receiving 
improved infrastructure services due 
to USG assistance
0 150 243 162 Yes
Comments: Beneficiaries include students and staff of DFAS, sister departments and units in the University of Cape Coast. Infrastructure services include 
refurbished offices, library, conference rooms, laboratory and vehicles.
18
Number of new research 
collaborations established between 
USG-supported beneficiaries and 
other institutions
0 10 15 150 Yes
Comments: This includes research collaborations established with departments in UCC as well as national and international organizations.
19
Number of scientific studies published 
or conference presentations given as a 
result of USG assistance for research 
programs
0 10 86 860 Yes
Comments: A few publications have been produced as a result of USG assistance but a greater portion of data feeding into this indicator was from conference 
presentations given as a result of USG assistance.
20
Number of dialogues and stakeholder 
consultations held on fisheries and 
coastal management
0 20 18 90 No
Comments: The number of planned dialogues and stakeholder consultations could not be achieved. 
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No. Indicator Baseline Life of Project 
target
Performance 
achieved 
(actual)
Performance 
achieved in (%)
On target? 
Yes/No
21
Percentage of graduates from USG￾supported tertiary education 
programs employed
0 50 11 30.56 No
Comments: Since the inception of the FCMCBSP, only three 11 (5 MPhil and 6 PhD) graduates supported by the project have been successfully employed. Some 
are temporary employment whereas others are permanent employment. It is expected that more graduates can be employed in relevant fisheries and coastal 
sectors as most of them recently completed their studies.
22 Number of CSOs and government 
agencies strengthened
0 25 30 120 Yes
Comments: Representatives of CSOs and government agencies are strengthened through their participation in the GIS, Fisheries Management, Climate Change 
and Integrated Coastal Management short courses. 
23 Total number of direct beneficiary 0 800 1,384 173 Yes
Comments: Since the beginning of the project, 1,384 individuals have benefited from activities such as organization of short course trainings, special trainings, 
support for undergraduate and postgraduate training, provision of technical and financial assistance to implement supplementary livelihood activities, refurbishment 
of office spaces, library, conference room, laboratory and procurement of vehicles and two conferences on Fisheries and Coastal Environment. Staff employed on 
the project as well as support staff of the University of Cape Coast were also counted. 
94 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ANNEX IV. FIELD WORK
Table 8. Final Evaluation Schedule
Dates and 
Time Interview Institution # of 
Participants
Phase I: Pre￾Planning
September 
2019-
November 
14
-Preparation of draft SWs
-Prepare successive drafts of preliminary work plan 
(before contracting)
-Team Leader has initial call with the FCMCBSP 
M&E Support to discuss how to work together on 
finalizing work plan, methodology and stakeholder 
list
November 
14-
November 
25
Work with M&E Support and M&E Coordinator to: 
(1) identify and organize critical documentation; (2) 
to finalize the stakeholder lists and develop a 
stakeholder matrix for the online interviews; (3) 
develop and review the preliminary draft 
questionnaires and guides based on the concepts 
presented in the preliminary work plan; (4) develop 
a cover memo for the FCMCBP M&E Coordinator 
to email to stakeholders about their availability to 
be interviewed; and (5) confirm email addresses 
and telephone contact information for draft 
stakeholder list
November 
25-
December 4
-FCMCBSP staff develops a model for evaluation 
pre-planning that includes (1) detailed follow-up on 
beneficiary lists to create summary tables for the 
evaluation team; (2) documentation system which 
includes a bibliography of the materials for the 
evaluation team
-Draft revised workplan submitted to METSS II and 
USAID December 4 including revised dates due to 
delay in procurement
December 4-
21
Work with FCMCBSP M&E Support, M&E 
Coordinator, and Project Manager to: (1) finalize 
draft interview schedule; and (2) finalize 
contracting.
Phase II: 
Fieldwork in 
Ghana
January 13 
(Monday)
Accra
08:30-10:00 Meeting with METSS Project Coordinator to 
review power point 
METSS
10:00-12:00 Meeting with National Consultants to discuss 
logistics and contracts
METSS
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Dates and 
Time Interview Institution # of 
Participants
14:00-16:00 Review work plan and timeline for deliverables with 
METSS and Project Team
METSS
16:00-19:00 FGD work plan review session USAID
19:00-20:00 Preparation of draft SOW for Technical Advisor METSS/UCC
January 14 
(Tuesday) 
Accra
07:00-10:00 Travel from Accra to Cape Coast and review of 
schedule and the evaluation questions 
UCC
10:00-12:00 FGD Former UCC undergraduate students who 
worked with the project
UCC 5
10:00-19:00 Preparation of survey forms and initial pilot of 
questions
15:00-19:00 Project Board Members UCC 8
January 15 
(Wednesday)
Cape Coast
08:00-09:30 FGD with Hen Mpoano (at their office in Takoradi) Hen Mpoano 
(National 
NGO)
5
10:00-11:30 FGD with Friends of the Nation (at their office in 
Takoradi)
Friends of the 
Nation 
(National 
NGO)
3
12:30-14:00 FGD with former Assistant Director of CSLP (at 
Goshen Global Vision in Takoradi)
CSLP 1
15:00-17:00 Regional MoFAD and other regional partners (at 
the MoFAD office)
MoFAD 4
09:00-21:00 Formal launch of survey after additional tests of 
survey and review of email addresses and additional 
discussion with project M&E Specialist
January 16 
(Thursday)
Western Region
09:00-11:00 FGD Ecological Wetland Monitoring school club in 
the Western region
Azulenoanu 
community 
school
6 adults + 40 
children
14:00-16:00 FGD Livelihood case study interviews (Anlo 
Beach)-FGD with District assembly members
Shama District 
assembly
8
17:00-18:00 FGD Livelihood case study interviews (Anlo
Beach)-community based interviews
Anlo beach bee 
rearing 
livelihood group
9
January 17 
(Friday)
Central Region
09:30-11:30 FGD Ecological Wetland Monitoring school club in 
the Central region- Gamoa Dago (beneficiaries, 
teachers, local leaders)
Ecological 
Wetland 
Monitoring 
21
96 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Dates and 
Time Interview Institution # of 
Participants
school club in 
the Central 
region- Gamoa 
Dago
13:00-16:00 FGD with the only Ekumfi District Assembly 
member who worked with the project’s livelihood 
activities in Narkwa
Narkwa District 
Assembly
1
16:00-18:00 FGD with Core Project Staff UCC Fisheries 
Project Staff
6
18:00-20:00 Meet with Project Director to revise and finalize 
SOW for evaluation Technical Advisor
January 18 
(Saturday)
Central Region 
07:00-12:00 KII livelihood case study interviews (Narkwa)-
community based interviews
Narkwa snail 
rearing 
livelihood group
1
09:00-15:00 Monitor survey and organization of documentation; 
review of focus groups. Sent follow-up emails.
January 20 
(Monday)
Cape Coast
09:00-10:30 FGD with faculty of Grant Recipient universities KNUST 10
11:00-12:30 FGD with faculty of Grant Recipient universities UG 4
13:00-14:30 FGD with faculty of Grant Recipient universities UENR 4
15:00-16:30 FGD with faculty of Grant Recipient universities UDS 5
09:00-17:00 Follow up calls to beneficiaries to complete surveys 
and data cleaning
January 21 
(Tuesday)
08:00-10:00 FGD with consultant (Developed Coastal 
Management short course) and consultant on the 
fisheries management short course
2
10:00-12:30 FGD with two specialists (both women) from the 
great Accra regional Fisheries Commission who 
were trained by the SFMP 
Fisheries 
Commission
2
13:00-16:00 FGD with three member of GITA GITA 3
16:00-18:00 Joint planning meeting with senior project staff UCC
08:30-18:00 Follow up calls to beneficiaries to complete surveys 
and data cleaning
January 22 
(Wednesday) 
08:30-10:00 FGD with SFMP staff). SFMP 3100
100 Actual interview with Dr. Crawford took place on 21st Jan via Skype
97 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Dates and 
Time Interview Institution # of 
Participants
10:30-12:00 Breakfast with media groups ( Media 
organizations
9
13:30-15:00 KII with consultant for livelihood activity 1
15:30-17:00 KII with consultant who lead the governance policy 
research as well as the conference, the society, and 
the journal
UG 1
08:00-18:00 -Follow up calls and emails to beneficiaries to 
complete surveys and data cleaning
-Collate data from FGDs
January 23 
(Thursday)
08:30-11:00 FGD with USAID Team USAID 3
1130-12:30 FGD Fisheries Commission meeting (national level 
at their office) 
Fisheries 
Commission
7
14:00-15:00 Review and collation of notes taken from FGDs 1
15:00-16:30 KII with the consultant who developed the FY2017 
business plans for the laboratory and the short 
term training
1
16:00-17:00 KII with FCMCBSP staff member about 
sustainability plans
17:15-18:30 FGD Consultant - Marine Fisheries Governance 
issues (multiple contracts) –
Inchu Airsy Co 
Ltd, University 
of Ghana
1
14:00-17:00 Audit survey results received
Collate FGD responses
File FGD responses
Reviewed FGD responses
January 24 
(Friday)
Cape Coast
08:00-09:00 KII with accounting staff (Enoch) to discuss project 
contract
UCC 1
09:00-11:00 FGD DFAS, CCM faculty UCC 8
11:00-13:00 FGD with Postgraduate students UCC 8
14:00-15:00 KII ATL FM (media group) for FGD ATL 1
16:00-17:00 KII Consultant for the GIS training and organization 
of all the trainings
Nature Today 1
17:00-18:30 KII with faculty member who backstopped the snail 
livelihood community-based activities
UCC 1
January 25 
(Saturday)
9:00-17:00 FGD FCR Meeting with Senior FCMCBSP Staff
98 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Dates and 
Time Interview Institution # of 
Participants
January 27
(Monday)
-FGD with Vice Chancellor, the Registrar and the 
Director of the Development Office
-Review/update with senior staff 
January 28
(Tuesday)
Accra
-Continue working on the FCR
-Complete preliminary analysis of the FGD/KIIs and 
the online survey
January 29
(Wednesday)
Prepare the USAID/G Presentation and
documentation for departure.
USAID/Ghana Debriefing 10
Phase III: 
Write-up
US
February 3-
28
-Write up
-Collaboration with team on preparation of the 
CCM history
--Collaboration with the technical advisor and the 
FCMCBSP on preparation of the technical review
- Submission of first draft to METSS II Project 
Coordinator
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Team, January 2020.
99 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 9. Stakeholder List Totals from Which Sample Was Drawn, Revised Stakeholder List from Which Sample Was Drawn, Number of 
People Included in the Interviews, and Total Number of People Interviewed for Each Stakeholder Category and Sub-Category in the 
FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation
Stakeholder 
Category
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using KIIs
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using 
FGDs
Proposed Samples 
for Data Collection 
Using Email
Questionnaires
Initial 
Stakeholder 
List Totals 
From Which 
Sample 
Drawn101*
Final 
Stakeholder 
List From 
Which 
Sample 
Drawn 
(verified by 
the 
consultants)
# of 
People 
Included 
in 
KII/FGD
# of People 
Included in 
Questionnaire
# of People 
in Each 
Category 
Interviewed
Totals 
(without 
double 
counting)
Stakeholder 
Category 1: Project 
staff, oversight 
committees, and 
administrators 
(total)
21 all 31 all
A. Full-time staff 
paid by the 
project
1 4 current + 5 former 
staff=9
4 current + 5 
former=9
23 (combined 
for 
Categories 
1.A, 1.B, and 
1.C)
6 10
B. Project 
Management 
Team (faculty + 
staff)
1 3 3 (+ 2 of which 
are also in 
category A)
See above 7 2
C. PMB 1 9 9 See above 8 9
D.1. Technical 
consultants 
4 17 102 5
101 Based on the initial list of verified lists prepared by the project.
102 Some double counting of staff in other categories.
100 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Stakeholder 
Category
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using KIIs
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using 
FGDs
Proposed Samples 
for Data Collection 
Using Email
Questionnaires
Initial 
Stakeholder 
List Totals 
From Which 
Sample 
Drawn101*
Final 
Stakeholder 
List From 
Which 
Sample 
Drawn 
(verified by 
the 
consultants)
# of 
People 
Included 
in 
KII/FGD
# of People 
Included in 
Questionnaire
# of People 
in Each 
Category 
Interviewed
Totals 
(without 
double 
counting)
(contracted to 
execute 
activities)
D.2. Consultants 
executing short 
courses (not 
contracts; per 
diem only)
25 103 3
104
Stakeholder 
Category 2: 
Government 
agencies (includes 
local, regional, and 
national 
government 
agencies)
73 all 92 all
2.A. 
District/municipal 
level (total)
4 101 191 in 38 
municipalities 
and districts
147 9 42
2.B. Regional 
level (total)
2 4 39 50 in 8 regions 4 24
103 Some double counting of staff in other categories.
104 Two short course consultants and the training/GIS training consultant.
101 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Stakeholder 
Category
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using KIIs
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using 
FGDs
Proposed Samples 
for Data Collection 
Using Email
Questionnaires
Initial 
Stakeholder 
List Totals 
From Which 
Sample 
Drawn101*
Final 
Stakeholder 
List From 
Which 
Sample 
Drawn 
(verified by 
the 
consultants)
# of 
People 
Included 
in 
KII/FGD
# of People 
Included in 
Questionnaire
# of People 
in Each 
Category 
Interviewed
Totals 
(without 
double 
counting)
2.C. National 
level (total)
1 16 20 9 4
2.D. 3 
government 
researchers 
attached to other 
CCM were 
included in this 
Category 3105
3
Stakeholder 
Category 3: 
Academic and 
research 
institutions (total)
39 all
3.A. Principal 
partner UCC 
8 121
(30 faculty, 44 
graduate students, 47 
undergraduates)
174 44 22106 23 all 26
3.B. Secondary 
partners in 
4 51 (17 faculty, 
6 researchers, 
N/A 23107 23
105 UCC and faculty only. Due to the high number of surveys being sent to the graduate students and undergraduates by DFAS and the CCM, the evaluators were advised to not 
send a separate questionnaire to them.
106 Faculty: 7; Undergrads: 5; VC and senior managers: 3; Graduate students: 7
107 KNUST: 10; UENR: 4; UDS: 5; UG: 4.
102 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Stakeholder 
Category
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using KIIs
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using 
FGDs
Proposed Samples 
for Data Collection 
Using Email
Questionnaires
Initial 
Stakeholder 
List Totals 
From Which 
Sample 
Drawn101*
Final 
Stakeholder 
List From 
Which 
Sample 
Drawn 
(verified by 
the 
consultants)
# of 
People 
Included 
in 
KII/FGD
# of People 
Included in 
Questionnaire
# of People 
in Each 
Category 
Interviewed
Totals 
(without 
double 
counting)
Ghana (UG, 
UDS, UENR, 
KNUST)
28 
undergraduate 
students)
Stakeholder 
Category 4: Other 
USAID-funded 
fisheries projects
4 (all)
4.A. SFMP (2014-
2019)
1 N/A 3
4.B. CSLP (2013-
2018)
1 N/A 1
Stakeholder 
Category 5: Local 
communities, 
CBOs, and 
resource users 
5.A. Community￾based activities 
(case studies)
77 (all)
5.A.1. Livelihood 
activities
1 3
(in 2 
communities)
4 communities N/A 9
103 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Stakeholder 
Category
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using KIIs
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using 
FGDs
Proposed Samples 
for Data Collection 
Using Email
Questionnaires
Initial 
Stakeholder 
List Totals 
From Which 
Sample 
Drawn101*
Final 
Stakeholder 
List From 
Which 
Sample 
Drawn 
(verified by 
the 
consultants)
# of 
People 
Included 
in 
KII/FGD
# of People 
Included in 
Questionnaire
# of People 
in Each 
Category 
Interviewed
Totals 
(without 
double 
counting)
5.A.2. Ecological 
monitoring of 
wetlands
6 2 schools; 10 
teachers
2 communities
68
5.B. NGO 
partners (that 
participated in
short-term 
training and 
conferences)
15 all
2 with 
NGOs 
included in 
the wetlands 
case studies 
(5.A.2)
10 ( focal persons) 21 108 from 8 
NGOs
12 8 9 all
(including 
producer 
groups)
5.C. Fisheries 
producer 
group/unions
3
1 5 Over 20 109 3 See above
108 People who participated in training and conferences. This does not include the wider interactions of the project with Hen Mpoano and Friends of the Nation, which 
collaborated on the ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities activity.
109 Numbers still being calculated
104 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Stakeholder 
Category
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using KIIs
Proposed 
Samples 
for Data 
Collection 
Using 
FGDs
Proposed Samples 
for Data Collection 
Using Email
Questionnaires
Initial 
Stakeholder 
List Totals 
From Which 
Sample 
Drawn101*
Final 
Stakeholder 
List From 
Which 
Sample 
Drawn 
(verified by 
the 
consultants)
# of 
People 
Included 
in 
KII/FGD
# of People 
Included in 
Questionnaire
# of People 
in Each 
Category 
Interviewed
Totals 
(without 
double 
counting)
Stakeholder 
Category 6: Media
18 all
2 21 21 
outlets/stations 
(70 people)
50 10 all
Stakeholder 
Category 7: USAID 
AOR/Contracting 
Officer’s 
Representative
(COR) for the 
project (past and 
present)
3
1 3 3
TOTAL 7 41 334 276 194 143 305
Source: Della E. McMillan, Lynn Hurtak, and Annie Dela Akanko. 2019. FCMCBSP Final Evaluation. Accra, Ghana; and Monitoring, Evaluation, and Technical Support Services 
(METSS) II Project from M&E Support Joshua Adotey, based on project records and verification of email addresses. December 1, 2019. 
105 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 10. List of People Interviewed in the FCMCBSP Final Evaluation Focus Group Discussions and 
Key Informant Interviews, January 2020
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
1 Mark Newton USAID COR 7
2 Susan Bonney USAID AOR - Current 7
3 Ellis Ekekpi USAID M&E focal point 7
4 Justice Yeboah UCC Teaching Assistant 3
5 Samuel Ayitey UCC Teaching Assistant 3
6 Elizabeth 
Agyekumwaa
UCC Teaching Assistant 3
7 Alex Boateng
Asomaning
UCC Teaching Assistant 3
8 Benjamin D 
Gawornu
UCC Teaching and Research
Assistant
3
9 Prof. Denis 
Worlanyo Aheto
UCC Board member 1
10 Dr. Noble K. Asare UCC Board member 1
11 Mr. Samuel 
Akuamoah-Boateng
UCC Board member 1
12 Mr. Nicholas 
Ampofo 
UCC Board member 1
13 Prof. John Blay UCC Board member 1
14 Prof. Kobina 
Yankson
UCC Board member 1
15 Eric Awotwi UCC College Finance Officer 1
16 Enoch Enchill Essoun UCC Accounts 1
17 Stephen Kankam Hen Mpoano Deputy Director 5
18 Cephas Asare Hen Mpoano Program Officer 5
19 Justice Camillus Hen Mpoano Program Officer 5
20 Adiza Ama Owusu Hen Mpoano Program Officer 5
21 Robert Allou Hen Mpoano Finance and Admin 
Manager
5
22 Donkris Mevuta Friends of the Nation Executive Director 5
23 Philip Prah Friends of the Nation Project Officer 5
24 Kyei K. Yamoah Friends of the Nation Program Manager 5
25 Emmanuel Ntiri CSLP Assistant Director 4
110 Category 1: Project staff, oversight committees, and administrators; Category 2: Government agencies (local, regional, and 
national government agencies); Category 3: Academic and research institutions; Category 4: Other USAID-funded fisheries 
projects; Category 5: Local communities, CBOs, and NGO partners that benefitted from training; fisheries producer 
groups/unions and resource users (four district-level interventions); Category 6: Media; and Category 7: USAID/AOR/COR for 
the project (past and present).
106 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
26 Godfrey Baidoo￾Tsibu
MoFAD MoFAD Staff 2
27 Alhassan Arafat MoFAD MoFAD Staff 2
28 Patrick Tawiah MoFAD MoFAD Staff 2
29 Emmanuel Kojo 
Owusu
MoFAD MoFAD Staff 2
30 Patrick Blay Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club-Azulenoanu Community 
School (Western Region)
Class Teacher (VSLA, Uit 
Committee member)
5
31 John Ofori Blay Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club-Azulenoanu Community 
School (Western Region)
Assistant Headteacher 5
32 Clentis Apeko 
Donkor
Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club-Azulenoanu Community 
School (Western Region)
Class Teacher 5
33 Peter Ackah Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club-Azulenoanu Community 
School (Western Region)
Class Teacher 5
34 Grace Konadu 
Appiah
Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club-Azulenoanu Community 
School (Western Region)
Class Teacher 5
35a James Eru Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club-Azulenoanu Community 
School (Western Region)
Headmaster (SHS) 5
35b Azulenuanu 
Community School 
Students111
Azulenuanu Community School 
(Western Region)
Students 5
36 Sammuel Baidoo Jnr Shama District Assembly Report Writer 2
37 Michael Agyei Shama District Assembly Ag. Head 2
38 Ahaji Adu Mahama Shama District Assembly District Officer (Planning 
Unit)
2
39 Peter Doh Afetsu Shama District Assembly Assistant Physical Planning 
Officer
2
40 E Aboagyeh-Aggrey Shama District Assembly District Director of Agric 2
41 Emmanuel Nana 
Lartel
Shama District Assembly District Budget Analyst 2
42 Richard Blevi Shama District Assembly District Coordination 
Director
2
43 Emmanuel Kudor Shama District Assembly District Environmental 
Health Officer
2
44 Cephas Kwesi Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Secretary 5
111 Forty students participated in the discussion, but their names were not recorded.
107 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
45 Nobel Dogbatse Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Treasurer 5
46 Togbe Tekple 
Garikor
Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Chief 5
47 Kennedy Attipoe Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Organizer 5
48 Enyonam Cledo Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Member 5
49 Mercy Dziwornu Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Member 5
50 Simon Atriatormeh Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Member 5
51 Emmanuel Kalepe Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Member 5
52 Francis Bolu Anlo Beach Livelihood Group Member 5
53 Francis Acquah Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
54 Agartha Arthur Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
55 Ransford Gyaaben Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Under Training 5
56 Rose Kaayah Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
57 Mercy Gyapson Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
58 Peter Kweku Musah Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
59 Kwansa Abbiw Eshun Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
60 John Wilson Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Under Training 5
61 Joseph Otsibu Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
62 Rejoice Nyanu Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Teacher 5
63 Kester Acquah Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Head teacher 5
64 S.K. Saw Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
SMC Chairman 5
65 E.B. Chartey Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
PTA Chairman 5
66 Nana Bobo Ewusi￾Tawiah
Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Opinion Leader (Chief) 5
67 Rosemary Ehyiusah 
Narh
Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
68 Elizabeth Apeteh Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
108 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
69 Emmauel Ansah
Ofosu
Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Teacher 5
70 Isaac Kojo Arkorful Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Teacher 5
71 Ruth Sakyi Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Teacher 5
72 Solomon Akwatia Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Teacher 5
73 Emmanuel K Mensah Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Teacher 5
74 Paul Freku Eco. Wetland Monitoring School 
Club (Central Region)
Student 5
75 Rexford Ofosuhene Ekumfi District Assembly Head, Business Advisory 
Center
2
76 Esinam Attipoe USAID/Ghana UCC Project Project Management 
Support
1
77 Ivy S.G. Akuoko USAID/Ghana UCC Project Principal Research 
Assistant
1
78 Ernest O. Chuku USAID/Ghana UCC Project Principal Research 
Assistant
1
79 Evans K. Arizi USAID/Ghana UCC Project Principal Research 
Assistant
1
80 Joshua Adotey USAID/Ghana UCC Project Monitoring and Evaluation 
Support
1
81 Sika Abrokwah USAID/Ghana UCC Project Principal Research 
Assistant
1
82 Dr. Sam Addo UG Head of Dept Marine and 
Fisheries Science
3
83 Dr. Ben Botwe UG Lecturer 3
84 Mr. Nana Frempong 
Manso 
UG Student, Beneficiary 
undergrad
3
85 Ms. Zainab Umar 
Mohammed
UG Student, Beneficiary 
undergrad
3
86 Dr Akwasi Ampofo 
Yaboah
UDS 3
87 Daniel Nsoh UDS 3
88 Frida Safo UDS 3
89 Nicholas Darku UDS 3
90 Annane Kwabena UDS 3
91 Dr. Berchie Asiedu UENR UENR, Fisheries and water 
resources department.
3
109 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
92 Dr. SeyramSarah B. 
Setufe
UENR UENR, Fisheries and water 
resources department
3
93 Samuel K.K. 
Amponsah
UENR 3
94 Richard Klutse UENR Lecturer tenured 3
95 Ehud Sarfo Adusei￾Kwaoboadu
KNUST Student 3
96 Kumah Mabel KNUST Student 3
97 Anthea Georgina 
Ama Ofori
KNUST Student 3
98 Johnmark Nyame 
Acheampong
KNUST Student 3
99 Sophia Sedem 
Owuodihia
KNUST Student 3
100 Onwonah-Owiredu 
Daniel
KNUST Student 3
101 Prof. Daniel Adjei￾Boateng
KNUST Lecturer 3
102 Prof. Nelson 
Winston Agbo
KNUST Lecturer 3
103 Dr. Regina Edziyie KNUST Lecturer 3
104 Dr. Kwasi Adu 
Obirikorang
KNUST Lecturer 3
105 Dr. Kofi Abban Coastal Management Consultancy Consultant 1
106 Francis Nunoo Fisheries Management Consultancy Consultant 1
107 Rosina Williams Fisheries Commission Senior Fisheries Manager 2
108 Samantha Vida Osei Fisheries Commission Senior Fisheries Research 
Manager
2
109 Jerome Deamesi GITA Association member 5
110 Kate Ansah GITA Association member 5
111 Richster N. Amarh 
Amarfio
GITA Association member 5
112 Dr Raymond 
Babanawo
SFMP Chief of Party 4
113 Enoch Ebo Appiah SFMP Deputy Chief of Party 4
114 Brian Crowford SFMP Project Manager 4
115 Emelia Ennin Daly Graphic Media Person 6
116 Joyce Gyekye Gyekye Media Person 6
117 Lydia Kukua 
Asamoah
Ghana News Agency Media Person 6
110 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
118 Noami Henrietta 
Badasu
Kekeli/Jubilee Media Person 6
119 Peter Quao Adattor TV3 Media Person 6
120 Jonathan Ofori Twin City FM Media Person 6
121 Gabriel Ahiagbor Daily Graphic Media Person 6
122 Francisca Arhin GH One TV Media Person 6
123 Edzorna F Mensah GBC online Media Person 6
124 Abena Acheampong Livelihood Consultancy Livelihood Consultant 1
125 Benjamin Campion Policy Consultancy Policy Consultant 1
126 Yaa Tiwaa Amah Fisheries Commission Principal Fisheries Manager 2
127 Richner Odonkor Fisheries Commission Principal Fisheries Manager 2
128 Matilda Quist Fisheries Commission Head Marine Fisheries 
Management Division
2
129 Rebecca Sackey￾Mensah
Fisheries Commission Senior Fisheries Manager 2
130 Samuel D. Manu Fisheries Commission Head Post-Harvest 2
131 Hayford Agbekpornu Fisheries Commission Snr. Planner (M&E) 2
132 Kofi Amador Fisheries Commission Head, Fisheries Scientific 
Survey Division
2
133 Jacob Ainoo-Ansah Business Plan Consultancy Business Plan Consultant 1
134 George Darpaah Marine Fisheries Consultancy Marine Fisheries 
Consultant
1
135 Enoch Enchill Essuon UCC Directorate of Finance 1
135 Paul Mensah UCC (DFAS) Lecturer 3
136 Thomas Davis UCC (DFAS) Principal Technician 3
137 Prosper Dordunu UCC (DFAS) Senior Lab Technician 3
138 Kwadwo Mireku UCC (DFAS) Lecturer 3
139 Donatus Angnuureng UCC (CCM) Lecturer 3
140 Precious Mattah UCC (CCM) Research Fellow 3
141 Joseph Debrah UCC (DFAS) Senior Lecturer 3
142 Alberta Jonah UCC Ph.D. Candidate 3
143 Michele Clottey UCC Ph.D. Candidate 3
144 Success Sowah UCC M.Phil. Student 3
145 Ebenezer Kpelly UCC Ph.D. Candidate 3
146 Isaac Osei UCC Ph.D. Candidate 3
147 Eugenia Amador UCC M.Phil. Student 3
148 Lesley Ntim UCC Ph.D. Candidate 3
149 Mary Ama Bawa ATL Radio Deputy Editor 6
111 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
N° First and Last 
Name Organization Function/Role Category110
150 Cynthia Okine Nature Today Training Consultant 1
151 Prof. Kweku Monney UCC Snail Consultant 1
152 Prof Joseph Ghartey 
Ampiah
UCC Vice Chancellor 1
153 Mr Philip Ntim UCC Head, Physical 
Development
1
154 Mr. John Kofi Nyan UCC Registrar 1
Source: FCMCBSP Evaluation Team
112 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 11. Summary Responses to Major FGD Questions by Different Stakeholder Groups
Questions Staff 
(x/8)
Government 
(x/4)
Academic 
and 
Research 
Institutions 
(x/7)
Other
USAID￾Funded 
Fisheries 
Projects
(x/2)
NGOs/ 
Producer 
Groups 
(x/3)
Media 
(x/2)
USAID 
(x/1)
EQs 1 & 2
1.a EQ 1.a. Organizational and human capacity (at your 
institution) has been strengthened as a result of the 
improved infrastructure and the increased technical and 
scientific knowledge generated by the USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project (rank 1-7)112 in the principal areas 
targeted by the project:
4 5 6 7 1 4 4 5 4 6 7 7 6 7 4 5 6 6
2.A. EQ 1.b. USAID/UCC Fisheries Project efforts to increase 
marine and coastal research and resource assessment and 
to strengthen the communication, extension, and outreach 
of marine and coastal research and resource assessment 
have increased information and knowledge for natural 
resource management for your institution (rank 1-7)
6 6 7 7 
7
1 1 6 5 6 7 7 6 7 5 6 6 6.5&7
3.A. EQ 1.b. Please rank the most effective methods of 
information-sharing that the project used to build the 
capacity of the staff and/or members of your organization. 
(rank 1-7)
a) Conferences 6 7 7 1 6 7 1 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 6 7 7 7 7
b) Short courses 6 7 7 6 7 7 1 1 1 5 7 7 5 6 6 7 7 7 6.5
c) Workshops 7 7 1 6 7 1 1 6 7 7 7 7 7 1 5 7 7
d) Newspaper articles 4 5 5 7 1 1 6 7 1 1 4 4&5 7 7 6 6 5 5 7 6.5
e) Communiqués (from the project’s workshops and 
conferences)
5 7 7 7 1 1 6 7 1 1 5 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 7
f) Social Media (WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook) 4 7 7 7 1 5 6 6 1 5 6 6 7 7 7 6 6 6 6
112 7 strongly agree; 4 neither agree or disagree (no opinion); 1 strongly disagree; blank [will not answer]
113 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Questions Staff 
(x/8)
Government 
(x/4)
Academic 
and 
Research 
Institutions 
(x/7)
Other
USAID￾Funded 
Fisheries 
Projects
(x/2)
NGOs/ 
Producer 
Groups 
(x/3)
Media 
(x/2)
USAID 
(x/1)
g) Radio and TV programs 5 7 7 7 1 6 6 6 1 1 6 7 7 7 6 7 5 6 6 7
h) FishCoMGhana database 6 6 7 7 1 1 1 7 1 6 6 7 7 7 7 6 7
i) Classroom instruction 4 7 7 1 6 1 6 6 6 7 7 1 7
j) Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 6 6 7 1 1 4 5 1 6 6 7 7 7 6 7 7
k) Fisheries and Aquaculture Society of Ghana 4 6 7 1 1 4 4 1 1 4 6 6 7 1 7 6
l) UCC DFAS and CCM Websites 6 6&7 7 4 6 4 6 6 6&7 7 7 6
m) Other academic journal publications 4 7 1 7 6 7 6 6
4. The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s activities have
contributed the identification of important policy issues 
(rank 1-7)
7 7 7 1 6 7 6 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7
5. Policy makers have responded to some of the issues raised 
by the activities (rank 1-7)
5 6 7 1 7 7 1 5 5 5 7 7 7 6&6.5&7
EQs 3 & EQ 4
6 EQ 3. The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s collaboration 
with the USAID-funded CSLP and SFMP, GoG Partners like 
MoFAD, and other donor projects and the private sector 
have helped strengthen the global capacity for sustainable 
fisheries and coastal resources management in Ghana? 
(rank 1-7) 
7 7 7 1 5 6 7 5 6 6 7 7 4 7 7
7
EQ 4. The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to capacity building in 
sustainable fisheries and coastal resources management?
Please rank what the group fields are the principle gender 
issues related to capacity building for these different 
groups. 
5 7 1 5 6 7 1 5 5 6 6 6.5
EQs 5 & 6
114 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Questions Staff 
(x/8)
Government 
(x/4)
Academic 
and 
Research 
Institutions 
(x/7)
Other
USAID￾Funded 
Fisheries 
Projects
(x/2)
NGOs/ 
Producer 
Groups 
(x/3)
Media 
(x/2)
USAID 
(x/1)
8 EQ 5. To what extent are the USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project’s capacity strengthening interventions likely to 
continue after USG support? (rank 1-7)
5 6 6 6 
6 6
1 4 1 5 5 6 6 6 6 4 6 6 6.5&7
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation FGDs, January 2020.
115 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 12. Additional Summary Responses to Major FGD Questions by Different Stakeholder Groups; Most Effective Methods of 
Information Sharing to Build Capacity, Group Consensus on Rankings (1-7) for Stakeholder Group 3.A
Questions/Statements PMB Project 
Staff
Policy 
Consultant
Business 
Plan 
Consultant
Livelihoods
Consultant
Marine 
Fisheries 
Consultant
Training 
Consultant
Snail 
Consultant
EQ 1.b. Please rank the most effective 
methods of information-sharing that 
the project used to build the capacity 
of the staff and/or members of your 
organization.
a) Conferences 7 6 7
b) Short courses 7 6 7
c) Workshops 7 n/a 7
d) Newspaper articles 4 5 5 7
e) Communiqués (from the project’s 
workshops and conferences)
7 7 5 7
f) Social media (WhatsApp, Twitter, 
Facebook)
6 7 4 7
g) Radio and TV programs 6 5 7 7
h) FishCoMGhana database 7 6 6 7
i) Classroom instruction 7 7 4
j) Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management
7 6 7
k) Fisheries and Aquaculture Society of 
Ghana
5 4 7
l) UCC, DFAS, and CCM websites 6. 6 7
m) Other academic journal 
publications
6 4
n) Other: Exchange visits 7
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation FGDs, January 2020.
116 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 13. Major Stakeholder Groups and Response Rate for the FCMCBSP Final Evaluation Online 
Questionnaire, Disaggregated by Gender 
Stakeholder 
Group
Number of 
Questionnaires 
Sent
Number of 
Questionnaires 
Answered
Number of Males 
Who Answered
Number of 
Females Who
Answered
Stakeholder 
Category 1: Project 
Staff, Oversight 
Committees and 
Administrators
23 21 (91%) 14 7
Stakeholder 
Category 2: 
Government 
Agencies (national, 
regional, district)
147 73 (50%) 55 18
Stakeholder 3: 
UCC Faculty and 
Researchers
44 23 (52%) 19 4
Stakeholder 5.B: 
NGOs and 
Producer Groups
12 9 (75%) 8 1
Stakeholder 
Category 6: Media
50 17 (34%) 9 8
TOTAL 276 143 (52%) 105 (73%) 38 (27%)
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 14. Question Asked of All UCC Staff, Administrators, and Researchers in the FCMCBSP Final 
Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire
Question
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who 
Scored
5-7
My personal knowledge and skills have been 
strengthened as a result of the USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project.
7 5 16 16 84% 
(37/44)
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 15. Questions Asked of All Government, NGOs/Producer Groups, and Media in the 
FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire
Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have improved MY 
PERSONAL TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC 
KNOWLEDGE of the most critical issues 
related to fisheries and coastal resource 
management.
4 11 50 34 96%
(95/99)
I expect to continue to use the skills and 
networks I acquired as a result of the project 
in the future
- 7 24 68 100%
(99/99)
117 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 16. Questions Asked of All Participants (Stakeholder Groups 1, 2, 3.A, 5.B, and 6) in the 
FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire
Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences gave participants a forum to share 
knowledge and concerns
- 2 16 47 100% 
(65/65113)
If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences encouraged the government to 
implement policies that promote sustainable 
fisheries and coastal management.
8 9 17 32 88%
(58/66)
If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The USAID/UCC 
conferences have increased information and 
knowledge for natural resource management.
1 4 20 41 98%
(65/66)
The Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management contributes to information and 
knowledge for natural resource management.
18 11 57 57 87% 
(125/143)
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 17. Stakeholder Group 1: Project Staff, Oversight Committee, and Administrator Responses 
for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Ranking Questions (x/21)
Q 
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who 
Scored 
5-7
1 My personal knowledge and skills have been 
strengthened as a result of the USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project. 
- 3 9 9 100
2 The organizational and human capacity of the 
Department of Fisheries and Aquatic 
Sciences/Centre for Coastal Management 
(DFAS/CCM) at UCC has been strengthened as a 
result of the improved infrastructure and capacity 
building facilitated by the USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project. 
- - 7 14 100
3 The organizational and human capacity of other 
UCC departments (not DFAS) has been 
strengthened as a result of the improved 
infrastructure and capacity building facilitated by 
the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project. 
4 4 8 5 81
4 The organizational and human capacity of the 
UCC DFAS has been strengthened as a result of 
113 There is a denominator of 65 for this question because one person who attended either/both conferences did not answer it. 
118 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q 
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who 
Scored 
5-7
the increased technical and scientific knowledge 
generated by the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project 
in the areas of: 
Fisheries management 1 2 11 7 95
Coastal management - 3 11 7 100
Fish stock assessment (shell and fin fish) 1 6 9 5 95
GIS and remote sensing - 6 8 7 100
Coastal ecosystems and biodiversity sciences 1 6 8 6 95
Climate change studies - 9 7 5 100
Small undergraduate research grants 1 1 13 6 95
Postgraduate scholarships - 2 9 10 100
J-term undergraduate student exchange program 
with the University of Rhode Island
1 4 7 9 95
Academic/administrative and technical capacity 
strengthening activities
- 5 6 10 100
5 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has built the 
capacity of CCM for national and leadership in 
fisheries and coastal issues over the last 5 years. 
- 2 6 13 100
7 The organizational and human capacity of the 
UCC DFAS has been strengthened as a result of 
the increased technical and scientific knowledge 
generated by the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project 
in the areas of: 
Increased grantsmanship and donor funding of 
other institutional activities
- 1 10 10 100
Student enrollment 1 3 10 7 95
Quality of students enrolled - - 13 8 100
Student participation in other institutional 
activities (donor projects and research)
1 3 11 6 95
Quality and quantity of research - 2 8 11 100
Scope of research - 2 10 9 100
Quality and quantity of publications 1 2 11 7 95
9 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences gave participants a forum to share 
knowledge and concerns. 
- - 3 14 100
(17/17)
10 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences encouraged the government to 
implement policies that promote sustainable 
fisheries and coastal management. 
1 3 6 7 94 
(16/17)
119 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q 
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who 
Scored 
5-7
11 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The USAID/UCC 
conferences have increased information and 
knowledge for natural resource management. 
- 1 6 10 100 
(17/17)
12 The Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 
contributes to information and knowledge for 
natural resource management. 
- 1 8 12 100
13 USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s efforts to 
improve the communication, extension, and 
outreach of marine and coastal research and 
resource assessment has increased the 
dissemination of information and knowledge 
about the key issues facing fisheries and coastal 
resource management: 
For the most important national-level policy 
institutions.
- 1 10 10 100
For the most relevant regional Ministry offices in 
four regions (Central, Western, Volta, and 
Greater Accra)
2 3 10 6 90
For the most relevant regional offices in two 
regions (Central and Western)
2 5 6 8 90
For the most relevant regional and district offices 
in two regions (Central and Western)
2 5 6 8 90
14 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s M&E system 
provided consistent monitoring about the 
effectiveness of the project’s communication, 
extension, and outreach activities in increasing 
information and knowledge for natural resource 
management: 
At the national level 5 5 8 3 76
At the regional level 6 4 9 2 71
At the district level 7 3 9 2 67
15 The project’s M&E system was adequate to track 
results and impact for the full five years of the 
project 
6 5 9 1 71
17 The UCC Project Management Team has had 
adequate time to invest in the project activities. 
3 1 9 8 86
19 The project’s networks created with its regional 
partners (zonal fisheries commission, MoFAD, 
and district assemblies, etc.) are sustainable. 
3 2 11 5 86
20 Project procurement systems contribute to 
timely processing of activities and equipment 
needed to achieve results. 
10 4 5 2 52
22 UCC’s accounting department has adequate 
staffing to support project activities and goals 
6 4 8 3 71
120 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q 
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who 
Scored 
5-7
24 The Centre for Coastal Management has 
adequate staff support to continue its mission 
once the project funding ends. 
9 3 4 5 57
25 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s efforts to 
promote sustainable livelihood activities (i.e. snail 
farming, oyster farming, and beekeeping) for the 
community-based fisheries management groups 
has increased opportunities for income 
generation amongst the fisher families in the four 
targeted communities. 
6 10 4 1 71
27 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s pilot on 
ecological monitoring of wetlands using junior 
high schools has promoted community-based 
monitoring of natural resources. 
4 3 11 3 81
29 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project support for 
livelihood activities has built the capacity of local 
community-based organizations to improve their 
advocacy, their ability to seek answers, and their 
ability to engage positively with local authorities 
in the governance of fisheries and coastal 
resources. 
6 7 8 - 71
30 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s support for 
ecological monitoring of wetlands using junior 
high schools has built the capacity of local 
community-based organizations and the CSOs 
(Hen Mpoano and Friends of the Nation) to 
improve their advocacy, their ability to seek 
answers, and their ability to engage positively 
with local authorities in the governance of 
fisheries and coastal resources. 
5 3 9 4 76
33 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s 
collaboration with the following projects and 
institutions has strengthened their capacity for 
sustainable fisheries and coastal resources 
management. 
The USAID-funded SFMP 4 1 7 9 81
The USAID-funded CSLP 5 5 6 5 76
MoFAD (at all levels) 2 2 8 9 90
Other government agencies (not MoFAD) 3 5 8 5 86
Other donor-funded projects 4 3 9 5 81
International NGOs working on environmental 
issues in Ghana
8 2 7 4 62
National NGOs working on coastal resource 
management in Ghana
3 1 10 7 86
Producer organizations in Ghana (like GITA) 6 4 6 5 71
121 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q 
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who 
Scored 
5-7
35 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to capacity 
building in sustainable fisheries and coastal 
resources management. 
2 5 7 7 90
36 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
capacity-building of STUDENTS at UCC. 
- 1 4 16 100
37 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
capacity-building of the FACULTY at UCC.
7 5 2 7 67
38 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
capacity-building of the REGIONAL, DISTRICT, 
AND ZONAL OFFICES of the principal 
ministries involved in fisheries and coastal 
resource management.
9 5 3 4 57
39 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
address the gender issues in its two community￾based initiatives: 
The project’s livelihood activities 5 2 10 4 76
The project’s community-based wetlands 
management initiative using junior high schools
6 3 9 3 71
40 The following USAID/UCC Fisheries Project 
activities are likely to continue or be increased 
after the USAID funding ends 
Improved libraries/computer rooms 3 1 7 10 86
Improved laboratories 3 1 7 10 86
Improved vehicles 4 4 6 7 81
Short courses/ technical 3 2 8 8 86
Short courses/ journalists 3 7 6 5 86
Conferences 5 4 5 7 76
Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 3 - 6 12 86
Promote national-level policy dialogue 4 1 7 9 81
Faculty capacity-building 3 3 8 7 86
PhD/MPhil students research grants 4 3 7 7 81
Undergraduate training 2 1 10 8 90
Research 2 1 9 9 90
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
122 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 18. Stakeholder Group 1: Project Staff, Oversight Committee, and Administrator Responses 
for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Choice Questions (x/21)
41. Choose what you consider to be the MOST effective USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project activities. (Choose up to 5)
How many 
people chose
Renovating and equipping fisheries and coastal research laboratory 15
Refurbishing and equipping office/lecture/computer rooms and library 10
Acquisition of vehicles to support educational, training, research, and extension 
activities
9
Academic and technical staff capacity strengthening 5
Operationalization of the Centre for Coastal Management 14
Support for postgraduate (MPhil & PhD) training program 18
Undergraduate research grants and J-Term students exchange program 6
Conducting fisheries stock assessment 4
Conducting research and assessment on marine fisheries governance issues -
Research on fish and shellfish of commercial value 1
Analysis of value chains of fish trade -
Monitor the biodiversity and health of coastal ecosystems 2
Developing marine and coastal fisheries database 2
Developing material and conducting training on integrated coastal management 4
Developing material and conducting training on fisheries management 2
Developing manuals and updating training materials on climate change adaptation 
and mitigation
2
Developing material and conducting training on the use and application of 
Geographical Information Systems (GIS)
5
Engaging policy makers to address coastal and fisheries issues (including two 
national conferences and creation of a new online Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management)
9
Building institutional partnerships and collaboration 1
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities 2
Strengthening community-based groups 1
Promoting supplementary livelihoods in coastal communities 1
42. Choose what you consider to be the LEAST effective USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project activities. (Choose up to 5)
How many 
people chose
Renovating and equipping fisheries and coastal research laboratory 1
Refurbishing and equipping office/lecture/computer rooms and library -
Acquisition of vehicles to support educational, training, research, and extension 
activities
-
Academic and technical staff capacity strengthening -
Operationalization of the Centre for Coastal Management -
Support for postgraduate (MPhil & PhD) training program -
Undergraduate research grants and J-Term students exchange program 1
123 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Conducting fisheries stock assessment 1
Conducting research and assessment on marine fisheries governance issues 3
Research on fish and shellfish of commercial value 3
Analysis of value chains of fish trade 12
Monitor the biodiversity and health of coastal ecosystems 5
Developing marine and coastal fisheries database -
Developing material and conducting training on integrated coastal management -
Developing material and conducting training on fisheries management -
Developing manuals and updating training materials on climate change adaptation 
and mitigation
2
Developing material and conducting training on the use and application of 
Geographical Information Systems (GIS)
-
Engaging policy makers to address coastal and fisheries issues (including two 
national conferences and creation of a new online Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management)
1
Building institutional partnerships and collaboration -
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities 5
Strengthening community-based groups 15
Promoting supplementary livelihoods in coastal communities 18
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 19. Stakeholder Group 2: Government Agencies (Local, Regional, and National) Responses 
for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Ranking Questions (x/73)
Q# Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
2 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have improved MY 
TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 
of the most critical issues related to fisheries and 
coastal resource management. 
3 7 40 23 96
4 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my personal 
network with OTHER EXPERTS IN MY 
MINISTRY/AGENCY who are working on 
fisheries and coastal resource management issues 
(in general). 
10 12 28 13 86
5 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my personal 
network with GHANA’S LEADING EXPERTS on 
fisheries and coastal management in OTHER 
MINISTRIES/AGENCIES. 
15 15 30 13 79
6 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my working 
relationship to FISHERIES AND COASTAL 
11 19 25 18 85
124 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q# Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
MANAGEMENT EXPERTS in the University of 
Cape Coast.
7 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my working 
relationship to other UCC departments NOT 
RELATED TO FISHERIES AND COASTAL 
RESOURCE MANAGEMENT. 
33 25 9 6 55
10 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences gave participants a forum to share 
knowledge and concerns. 
- 1 4 9 100 
(14/14)
11 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences encouraged the government to 
implement policies that promote sustainable 
fisheries and coastal management. 
3 1 3 8 80 
(12/15)
12 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The USAID/UCC 
conferences have increased information and 
knowledge for natural resource management. 
1 - 5 9 93 
(14/15)
13 The Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 
contributes to information and knowledge for 
natural resource management. 
12 8 30 23 84
14 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have increased the quality of 
my Ministry/agency’s SUPPORT to fisheries and 
coastal management issues (i.e., it improved our 
ability to solve problems related to fisheries and 
coastal resource management). 
16 9 28 20 78
16 The COLLEAGUES from my Ministry/agency 
who participated in the USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project’s capacity-building activities have used 
that information to build the capacity of other 
colleagues. 
16 13 28 16 78
20 I expect to continue to use the skills and 
networks I acquired as a result of the 
USAID/UCC Fisheries Project in the future.
- 6 19 48 100
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 20. Stakeholder Group 2: Government Agencies (Local, Regional, and National) Responses 
for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Choice Questions (x/73)
1. What USAID/UCC Fisheries Project capacity-building activities did you 
and other members of your government agency participate in? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 66
Workshops 12
125 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Conferences 9
Technical backstopping 3
Research activities 6
Policy formulation review 3
Other: Introductory GIS Training 1
3. Which issues did you learn more about? How many 
people chose
Fisheries management 26
Coastal management 38
Fish stock assessment (shell and fin fish) 8
GIS and remote sensing 20
Climate change studies 22
17. How many existing or new initiatives in your Ministry/agency have 
been influenced by the capacity-building support that you or your 
colleagues personally received from the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project?
How many 
people chose
None 22 (30%)
1-5 45 (62%)
6-10 3 (4%)
11 or more 3 (4%)
21. What do you feel were the MOST effective USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project capacity-building activities that you participated in? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 66
Workshops 15
Conferences 7
Technical backstopping 4
Research activities 9
Policy formulation review 4
Other: Introductory GIS Training 1
Other: Participated only in short course 1
22. What do you feel were the LEAST effective elements of these 
USAID/UCC Fisheries Project activities (i.e., areas that need 
strengthening in the future)? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 20
Workshops 7
Conferences 9
Technical backstopping 12
Research activities 16
Policy formulation review 16
Other: Participated only in short course 6
Other: None 4
126 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Other: Was not part of policy formulation review 1
Other: Course duration was short 1
Other: Practical side of training 1
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 21. Stakeholder Group 2: Government Agencies (Local, Regional, and National) Responses 
for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Yes/No Question (x/73)
Question Yes No
8. I am a member of the project￾created Fisheries and 
Aquaculture Society of Ghana.
3 70
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 22. Stakeholder Group 3.A: UCC Faculty and Researcher Responses for the FCMCBSP Final 
Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Ranking Questions (x/23)
Q
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
1 My personal knowledge and skills have been 
strengthened as a result of the USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project.
7 2 7 7 70
6 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences gave participants a forum to share 
knowledge and concerns. 
- 1 4 10 100 
(15/15)
7 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences encouraged the government to 
implement policies that promote sustainable 
fisheries and coastal management. 
3 1 3 8 80 
(12/15)
8 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The USAID/UCC 
conferences have increased information and 
knowledge for natural resource management. 
- 2 2 11 100 
(15/15)
10 The Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 
contributes to information and knowledge for 
natural resource management. 
3 1 8 11 87
11 Organizational and human capacity has been 
strengthened as a result of the increased technical 
and scientific knowledge generated by the 
USAID/UCC Fisheries Project in the principal 
areas. 
Fisheries management - 3 15 5 100
Coastal management 1 3 14 5 96
Fish stock assessment (shell and fin fish) - 4 14 5 100
GIS and remote sensing 3 7 11 2 87
127 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
Coastal ecosystems and biodiversity sciences 4 4 10 5 83
Climate change studies 3 2 14 4 87
Small undergraduate research grants 2 3 10 8 91
J-term undergraduate student exchange program 
with the University of Rhode Island
4 1 13 5 83
Postgraduate scholarships - 1 14 8 100
Academic/administrative and technical capacity￾strengthening activities
2 2 13 6 91
12 Organizational and human capacity has been 
strengthened as a result of the improved 
infrastructure and capacity-building facilitated by 
the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project FOR THE 
UNIVERSITY OF CAPE COAST (AS A WHOLE). 
1 2 9 11 96
13 Organizational and human capacity of OTHER 
UCC DEPARTMENTS (not DFAS) has been 
strengthened as a result of the improved 
infrastructure and capacity building facilitated by 
the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project. 
6 2 7 8 74
14 If you are a member of the Department of 
Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences/Centre for Coastal 
Management (DFAS/CCM), please answer: 
Organizational and human capacity of the 
DFAS/CCM has been strengthened as a result of 
the improved infrastructure and capacity building 
facilitated by the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project. 
2 - 5 9 88 
(14/16)
15 If you are a member of DFAS/CCM, please 
answer: USAID/UCC Fisheries Project efforts to 
improve the communication, extension, and 
outreach of marine and coastal research and 
resource assessment have resulted in increased 
information and knowledge for natural resource 
management. 
- - 7 8 100 
(15/15)
16 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to capacity 
building in sustainable fisheries and coastal 
resources management. 
2 4 7 10 91
17 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
CAPACITY-BUILDING OF STUDENTS at UCC.
1 2 7 13 96
18 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
CAPACITY-BUILDING OF CONFERENCE 
PARTICIPANTS. 
1 3 9 10 96
19 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
5 1 8 9 78
128 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
CAPACITY-BUILDING OF SHORT COURSE 
PARTICIPANTS. 
20 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has effectively 
addressed the gender issues related to the 
CAPACITY-BUILDING OF WORKSHOP 
PARTICIPANTS. 
4 3 8 8 83
26 The following USAID/UCC Fisheries Project
activities should continue after the USAID funding 
ends: 
Improved libraries/computer rooms - - 3 20 100
Improved laboratories - - 3 20 100
Improved vehicles - 2 5 16 100
Short courses - - 3 20 100
Conferences 1 - 3 19 96
Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management - - 3 20 100
Promote national-level policy dialogue 1 - 3 19 96
Faculty capacity-building 1 - 6 16 96
PhD/MPhil students research grants - - 5 18 100
Undergraduate training - - 6 17 100
Research - - 2 21 100
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 23. Stakeholder Group 3.A: UCC Faculty and Researcher Responses for the FCMCBSP Final 
Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Choice Questions (x/23)
2. Which USAID/UCC Fisheries Project activities did you benefit from? Number that 
chose
Refurbished laboratories 8
Refurbished conference rooms 9
Refurbished library 7
Vehicles 10
Field equipment 9
Undergraduate research grants 1
Faculty capacity development 7
Consultancies to support livelihood activities 1
Attended conferences 12
Attended short courses 5
Serve as resources persons for short courses 3
Attended workshops 5
129 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Other:
CCM 1
Technical capacity development 1
Consultancy on research and assessment 1
Our farm was a centre for field visits 1
n/a 1
Financial management training 1
27. What do you feel were the MOST effective USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project activities that you participated in? 
How many 
people chose
Renovating and equipping fisheries and coastal research laboratory 14
Refurbishing and equipping office/lecture/computer rooms and library 6
Acquisition of vehicles to support educational, training, research, and extension 
activities
9
Academic and technical staff capacity strengthening 15
Operationalization of the Centre for Coastal Management 8
Support for postgraduate (MPhil & PhD) training program 10
Undergraduate research grants and J-Term students exchange program 4
Conducting fisheries stock assessment 1
Conducting research and assessment on marine fisheries governance issues 3
Research on fish and shellfish of commercial value 2
Analysis of value chains of fish trade 3
Monitor the biodiversity and health of coastal ecosystems 2
Developing marine and coastal fisheries database 6
Developing material and conducting training on integrated coastal management 1
Developing material and conducting training on fisheries management 2
Developing manuals and updating training materials on climate change adaptation and 
mitigation
1
Developing material and conducting training on the use and application of Geographical 
Information Systems (GIS)
0
Engaging policy makers to address coastal and fisheries issues (including two national 
conferences and creation of a new online Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management)
4
Building institutional partnerships and collaboration 5
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities 2
Strengthening community-based groups 5
Promoting supplementary livelihoods in coastal communities 4
28. What do you feel were the LEAST effective elements of the 
USAID/UCC Fisheries Project activities (i.e., areas that need strengthening 
in the future)? 
How many 
people chose
Renovating and equipping fisheries and coastal research laboratory 1
130 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Refurbishing and equipping office/lecture/computer rooms and library 2
Acquisition of vehicles to support educational, training, research, and extension 
activities
3
Academic and technical staff capacity strengthening 4
Operationalization of the Centre for Coastal Management 1
Support for postgraduate (MPhil & PhD) training program 2
Undergraduate research grants and J-Term students exchange program 2
Conducting fisheries stock assessment 4
Conducting research and assessment on marine fisheries governance issues 5
Research on fish and shellfish of commercial value 3
Analysis of value chains of fish trade 11
Monitor the biodiversity and health of coastal ecosystems 6
Developing marine and coastal fisheries database 2
Developing material and conducting training on integrated coastal management 2
Developing material and conducting training on fisheries management 2
Developing manuals and updating training materials on climate change adaptation and 
mitigation
3
Developing material and conducting training on the use and application of Geographical 
Information Systems (GIS)
2
Engaging policy makers to address coastal and fisheries issues (including two national 
conferences and creation of a new online Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management)
6
Building institutional partnerships and collaboration 4
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities 8
Strengthening community-based groups 7
Promoting supplementary livelihoods in coastal communities 8
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 24. Stakeholder Group 3.A: UCC Faculty and Researcher Responses for the FCMCBSP Final 
Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Yes/No Questions (x/23)
Question Yes No
Did Not 
Participate in a 
Training
9. I am a member of the project-created 
Fisheries and Aquaculture Society of Ghana.
5 18 -
21. If you participated in a training, are you 
using the knowledge and skills acquired in your 
day-to-day delivery of your work? 
11 - 12
22. If you participated in a training, have you 
used that information to train others in your 
institution?
10 1 12
24. The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project has 
created online materials to sustain the 
9 14 -
131 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
knowledge gained during trainings. Have you 
used any of these materials?
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 25. Stakeholder Group 3.A: UCC Faculty and Researcher Responses for the FCMCBSP Final 
Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Written Response Questions (x/23)
4. If you participated in a workshop, how many did you participate in?
• 4
• Annual Work Planning Workshops
• One(1)
• N/A
• 2
• Not applicable
• one
• About
• 3
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 26. Stakeholder Group 5.A And 5.B: NGO and Producer Group Responses for the FCMCBSP 
Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Ranking Questions (x/9)
Q
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
2 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have improved MY PERSONAL
TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE of 
the most critical issues related to fisheries and 
coastal resource management. 
- 3 4 2 100
4 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my 
PROFESSIONAL NETWORK with other experts 
in my CSO/producer group who are working on 
fisheries and coastal resource management issues 
(in general). 
1 2 4 2 89
5 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my 
PROFESSIONAL NETWORK with Ghana’s leading 
experts on fisheries and coastal management. 
1 2 4 2 89
6 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my 
PERSONAL working relationship with FISHERIES 
AND COASTAL MANAGEMENT EXPERTS in the 
University of Cape Coast. 
1 2 2 4 89
7 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my 
CSO/producer group’s working relationships with 
3 2 2 2 67
132 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q
#
Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored 
1-4
# Who 
Scored 
5
# Who 
Scored 
6
# Who 
Scored 
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
OTHER UCC DEPARTMENTS not related to 
fisheries and coastal resource management. 
10 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences gave participants a forum to share 
knowledge and concerns 
- - 1 6 100 
(7/7)
11 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences encouraged the government to 
implement policies that promote sustainable 
fisheries and coastal management. 
- 2 1 4 100
(7/7)
12 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The USAID/UCC 
conferences have increased information and 
knowledge for natural resource management. 
- 1 3 3 100 
(7/7)
13 The Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 
contributes to information and knowledge for 
natural resource management. 
2 1 3 3 78
15 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have increased the quality of my 
CSO/producer group’s SUPPORT to fisheries and 
coastal management issues (i.e., it has improved 
our ability to solve problems related to fisheries 
and coastal resource management) 
2 1 4 2 78
16 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have increased the FREQUENCY 
OF SUPPORT to fisheries and coastal resource 
management 
- 4 3 2 100
17 The colleagues from my CSO/producer group who 
participated in the USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s 
capacity-building activities have used that 
information to build the capacity of OTHER 
COLLEAGUES
3 3 - 3 67
18 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have contributed to POLICY 
DECISIONS. 
2 - 3 4 78
20 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have contributed to POLICY 
IMPLEMENTATION. 
2 - 4 3 78
22 I expect to continue to use the skills and networks 
I acquired as a result of the project in the future 
- 1 2 6 100
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
133 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 27. Stakeholder Group 5.A And 5.B: NGO and Producer Group Responses for the FCMCBSP 
Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Choice Questions (x/9)
1. What USAID/UCC Fisheries Project capacity-building activities did 
you participate in? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 6
Workshops 2
Conferences 6
Technical backstopping 1
Cuttlefish research project 4
Policy formulation review 1
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities 2
Undergraduates sponsored by the project for national service -
Hosted/collaborated with a graduate student working with the project 3
Hosted/collaborated with a professor/researcher working with the project 2
Hired a UCC graduate 3
Other: Capacity Building for UAV application 1
23. What do you feel were the MOST effective USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project capacity-building activities that you participated in? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 5
Workshops 2
Conferences 7
Technical backstopping -
Cuttlefish research project 1
Policy formulation review -
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities 2
Undergraduates sponsored by the project for national service 1
Hosted/collaborated with a graduate student working with the project 1
Hosted/collaborated with a professor/researcher working with the project 2
Hired a UCC graduate 1
Other: Capacity Building for UAV application 1
24. What do you feel were the LEAST effective elements of these 
USAID/UCC Fisheries Project activities (i.e., areas that need 
strengthening in the future)?
How many 
people chose
Short courses -
Workshops -
Conferences 1
Technical backstopping 1
Cuttlefish research project 2
Policy formulation review -
Wetlands ecological health monitoring using school clubs and communities -
134 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Undergraduates sponsored by the project for national service 1
Hosted/collaborated with a graduate student working with the project 1
Hosted/collaborated with a professor/researcher working with the project -
Hired a UCC graduate 1
Other: Every activity was useful 1
Other: Supplementary livelihood activities 1
Other: None 1
14. How many existing or new initiatives in your CSO/producer group
have been influenced by the capacity-building support that you or your 
colleagues personally received?
How many 
people chose
None 1
1-5 6
6-10 -
11 or more 2
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 28. Stakeholder Group 5.A And 5.B: NGO and Producer Group Responses for the FCMCBSP 
Final Performance Evaluation Online Questionnaire for Yes/No Question (x/9)
Question Yes No
8. I am a member of the project￾created Fisheries and 
Aquaculture Society of Ghana. 
- 9
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 29. Stakeholder Group 6: Media Responses for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation 
Online Questionnaire for Ranking Questions (x/17)
Q# Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored
1-4
# Who 
Scored
5
# Who 
Scored
6
3 Who 
Scored
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
3 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have IMPROVED MY 
TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 
of the most critical issues related to fisheries and 
coastal resource management. 
1 1 6 9 94
5 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have STRENGTHENED MY 
PERSONAL NETWORK WITH OTHER MEDIA 
EXPERTS working on fisheries and coastal 
resource management issues (in general). 
2 1 6 8 88
6 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have STRENGTHENED MY 
PERSONAL NETWORK WITH GHANA’S 
LEADING EXPERTS ON FISHERIES AND 
COASTAL MANAGEMENT. 
1 2 5 9 94
135 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q# Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored
1-4
# Who 
Scored
5
# Who 
Scored
6
3 Who 
Scored
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
8 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences gave participants a forum to share 
knowledge and concerns. 
- - 4 8 100 
(12/12)
9 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The biennial 
conferences encouraged the government to 
implement policies that promote sustainable 
fisheries and coastal management. 
1 2 4 5 92 
(11/12)
10 If you attended either/both conferences, please 
respond to this statement: The USAID/UCC 
conferences have increased information and 
knowledge for natural resource management. 
- - 4 8 100 
(12/12)
11 The Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management 
contributes to information and knowledge for 
natural resource management. 
1 - 8 8 94
12 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project-facilitated 
WhatsApp media group (Coast to Coast) has 
resulted in the increased sharing of information 
and knowledge for natural resource management 
to the public in Ghana. 
- 2 4 11 100
13 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have increased the QUALITY 
OF MY MEDIA OUTLET’S REPORTING on 
fisheries and coastal management issues. 
1 1 4 11 94
14 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have increased the 
FREQUENCY OF MY MEDIA OUTLET’S 
REPORTING on fisheries and coastal resource 
management issues. 
3 1 8 5 82
16 COLLEAGUES from my media outlet who 
participated in the USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project’s capacity-building activities have used 
that information to build the capacity of other 
colleagues. 
5 - 6 6 71
17 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my media 
outlet’s working relationship with FISHERIES 
AND COASTAL MANAGEMENT EXPERTS in 
the University of Cape Coast. 
1 1 8 7 94
18 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my media 
outlet’s working relationship with OTHER UCC 
DEPARTMENTS not related to fisheries and 
coastal resource management. 
4 5 5 3 76
19 The USAID/UCC Fisheries Project’s capacity￾building activities have strengthened my media 
2 4 7 4 88
136 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Q# Ranking Questions
# Who 
Scored
1-4
# Who 
Scored
5
# Who 
Scored
6
3 Who 
Scored
7
% Who
Scored
5-7
outlet’s working relationship with OTHER 
ACADEMIC INSTITUTIONS in Ghana. 
22 I expect to continue to use the skills and 
networks I acquired as a result of the 
USAID/UCC Fisheries Project in the future. 
- - 3 14 100
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 30. Stakeholder Group 6: Media Responses for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation 
Online Questionnaire for Choice Questions (x/17)
1. What USAID/UCC Fisheries Project capacity-building activities did you 
PARTICIPATE IN? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 10
Workshops 11
Conferences 9
Other: Event coverage 1
2. What USAID/UCC Fisheries Project capacity-building activities did you 
COVER AS A JOURNALIST?
How many 
people chose
Short courses 9
Workshops 11
Conferences 10
Other: Award ceremony for fishermen, fish mongers 1
15. How many articles/broadcasts on fisheries and coastal resource 
management issues has YOUR MEDIA OUTLET has produced in the last 
two years? 
How many 
people chose
None -
1-5 4
6-10 1
11-15 1
16-20 4
More than 20 7
23. What do you feel were the MOST effective USAID/UCC Fisheries 
Project activities that you participated in? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 10
Workshops 12
Conferences 4
Other: Coastal region tour 1
24. What do you feel were the LEAST effective elements of the USAID/UCC 
Fisheries Project activity (i.e., area that needs strengthening in the future)? 
How many 
people chose
Short courses 6
137 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Workshops 4
Conferences 7
Other: None (they were all useful) 4
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
Table 31. Stakeholder Group 6: Media Responses for the FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation 
Online Questionnaire for Yes/No Question (x/17)
Question Yes No
20. I am a member of the 
project-created Fisheries and 
Aquaculture Society of Ghana. 
7 10
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation online questionnaire results, January 2020.
138 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ANNEX V. ADDITIONAL TABLES
Table 32. Target Regions, Districts/Municipalities/Metropolitan Areas, and Communities for FCMCBSP Activities, FY 2014-2019 (X=Yes)
Regions
Districts/ 
Municipalities/ 
Metropolitan Areas
Communities Where Research 
Was Conducted and/or District￾Level Officials Attended the Two 
National Conferences
Research 
Districts and 
Fisheries 
Conference
Government 
Staff Training 
Courses
Project￾Implemented 
Community-Based 
Activities114
1 Central Abura-Asebu￾Kwamankese District
Moree X X X
2 Central Cape Coast 
Metropolitan 
X X
3 Central Komenda/ Edina 
/Eguafo/ Abirem 
Municipal
Elmina X X X
4 Central Ekumfi District Narkwa X X X
5 Central Effutu Municipal X
6 Central Gomoa West District Apam X X X
7 Central Gomoa East District X
8 Central Mfantsiman Municipal X
9 Central Upper Denkyira East 
Municipal
X
10 Central Awutu Senya District X
11 Volta Ketu South Municipal X
12 Volta Keta Municipal X X
13 Volta Ho Municipal X
14 Volta Nkwanta North 
District
X
114 In addition to the seven core activities described in the previous footnote, the project executed supplementary livelihood activities (e.g., snail farming, oyster farming, and 
beekeeping and strengthening of CBFMGs in these villages.
139 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Regions
Districts/ 
Municipalities/ 
Metropolitan Areas
Communities Where Research 
Was Conducted and/or District￾Level Officials Attended the Two 
National Conferences
Research 
Districts and 
Fisheries 
Conference
Government 
Staff Training 
Courses
Project￾Implemented 
Community-Based 
Activities114
15 Volta Hohoe Municipal X
16 Volta South Tongu District X
17 Western Ahanta West District X
18 Western Jomoro District Half Assini X X X
19 Western Shama District Anlo Beach X X X
20 Western Nzema East Municipal Axim X X X
21 Western Ahanta West District X X
22 Western Ellembele District Ankobra X X X
23 Western Sekondi-Takoradi 
Metropolitan
X X
24 Greater 
Accra 
Kpone Katamanso 
Municipal
X
25 Greater 
Accra 
Ledzokuku-Krowor 
Municipal
X
26 Greater 
Accra 
Accra Metropolitan X X
27 Greater 
Accra 
Dangme East District X
28 Greater 
Accra 
Tema Metropolitan X X
29 Greater 
Accra
Ada East District X X
30 Greater 
Accra 
Ada West District X X
31 Greater 
Accra 
Ningo Prampram 
District
X X
140 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Regions
Districts/ 
Municipalities/ 
Metropolitan Areas
Communities Where Research 
Was Conducted and/or District￾Level Officials Attended the Two 
National Conferences
Research 
Districts and 
Fisheries 
Conference
Government 
Staff Training 
Courses
Project￾Implemented 
Community-Based 
Activities114
32 Greater 
Accra
Ayawaso West 
District
X
33 Greater 
Accra 
Ga South Municipal X
34 Greater 
Accra
La Dade-Kotopon 
Municipal
X
35 Ashanti Kumasi Metropolitan 
Assembly
X
115
36 Brong￾Ahafo
Sunyani Municipal 
Assembly 
X
116 X
37 Northern Tamale Metropolitan 
Assembly
X
117
38 Greater 
Accra
Shai Osudoku District X
Source: USAID. 2019. Draft UCC FCMCBSP Evaluation SOW. Pg. 6. April 24, 2019 (Annex II) and FCMCBSP Communication, October 11, 2019. Revised November 15, 2019 
by FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey based on project M&E data. Updated April 8, 2020.
Table 33. Activities Frequently Identified as Examples of FCMCBSP Best Practice and Stakeholder Feedback on Reasons for This 
Identification
Activities Identified as Examples of Best Practice in FGDs and By 
the Evaluation Team Reasons Given for Identifying This as a Project Best Practice 
The biennial national conferences. “This produced concrete results” (DFAS faculty member)
The five assessments executed by the consultants with complementary 
assessments by the students.
“These studies got critical information out quickly, not through journals but 
through the annual conferences and workshops in ways that informed 
policy” (DFAS faculty member)
115 This district benefitted from small grants intended to support undergraduate research. Additionally, the faculty of KNUST (which is located in Kumasi Metropolitan) 
participated in FCMCBSP research activities as consultants.
116 This district only benefitted from small grants intended to support undergraduate research.
117 This district only benefitted from small grants intended to support undergraduate research.
141 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Activities Identified as Examples of Best Practice in FGDs and By 
the Evaluation Team Reasons Given for Identifying This as a Project Best Practice 
The collaborative model FCMCBSP developed with its four sister universities 
and the use of the undergraduate research fellowships to get students 
involved.
“This collaboration got results in terms of strengthening the exchange of 
information and people between the five universities through multiple 
channels that complemented the other sustainable linkages for maintaining 
these connections (Conferences, Journal, Society, FishCoMGhana) (DFAS 
faculty member)
1. The URI-UCC dual-degree program being pilot tested with DFAS. “The dual-degree program—which is just starting in 2020—exposes the 
students to different cultures and an international university, creates new 
and strengthens existing networks between the two institutions whilst 
building the capacity of both institutions students. For this to work, 
however, it needs to be part of a higher collaboration between the two 
universities. ” (DFAS faculty member)
2. The wetlands ecological monitoring with junior school students. “This is a promising model that produced concrete results very quickly that 
needs to be scaled up in both Ghana and in other coastal African countries 
(DFAS faculty member)
3. FCMCBSP’s decision to help build the capacity of GITA by: 1) involving 
them in one of the five research studies and assessments; 2) sponsoring 
(with SFMP) some of GITA’s senior members visiting URI; and 3) 
sponsoring some of their members participation in the biennial 
conferences.
“This had huge payoffs in terms of convincing the trawlers to support 
MoFAD’s decision to announce the first closed season” (DFAS faculty 
member)
4. The short-term professional training of DFAS staff. -“These trainings were not expensive and had lots of payoffs” (DFAS faculty 
member)
-Some of the specific examples cited in the FGDs and verified with the 
project included: 1) “One DFAS professor to study maritime law in 
Australia, which helped us to develop DFAS’s first course in environmental 
law;” 2) “Two other professors went to URI where they studied URI’s 
courses on climate change and adaptation which enabled him to introduce 
DFAS’s first course on climate change;” and 3) “Another professor got to 
study some of the new methodologies used to conduct stock assessments 
and learned how to use new analytical instruments for stock assessments 
which enabled him to come back and start the ‘age and growth’ lab in 
collaboration with URI” (DFAS faculty member)
142 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Activities Identified as Examples of Best Practice in FGDs and By 
the Evaluation Team Reasons Given for Identifying This as a Project Best Practice 
5. FCMCBSP developed a media strategy, including: 1) basic training 
combined with the field visits journalists needed to produce stories; 2) 
facilitating their participation in FCMCBSP-sponsored short-term 
trainings and in the biennial workshops; 3) encouraging them to consult 
DFAS and CCM staff for any technical help in clarify their studies; and 4) 
helping them to develop a WhatsApp group that makes it easy to alert 
members to new opportunities and information on different stakeholder 
groups.
-100 percent of the 12 media respondents for the online questionnaire 
agreed the FCMCBSP-facilitated WhatsApp group resulted in increased 
sharing of information and knowledge for NRM to the Ghanaian public, and 
94 percent agree the project’s capacity-building activities have increased the 
quality of their media outlet’s reporting.
- “The social media platform that was developed for the media should be 
developed for other groups and for the recipients of different types of CCM 
training” (DFAS faculty member)
Source: FCMCBSP Final Performance Evaluation FGDs and online questionnaire results, January 2020. 
Table 34. FCMCBSP Budget Breakdown by Project Output and Activity by Year, FY 2015-FY 2020. 
Project 
Outputs
Activity 
No.
Activity 
Description
FY 2015
Budget
FY 2016 
Budget
FY 2017
Budget
FY 2018
Budget
FY 2019
Budget
TOTAL 
(US$)
% 
Budget
Project 
Management
Management of 
Project and 
M&E
17,500.00 37,600.00 68,297.73 80,537.70 131,797.73 335,733.15 6.10
Compensation 
for Hired 
Administration 
and Operations 
Staff
107,631.29 104,803.96 113,636.98 134,780.89 81,290.52 542,143.64 9.86
SUB-TOTAL 125,131.29 142,403.96 181,934.70 215,318.60 213,088.25 877,876.80 16.0
Project 
Output 1.1
1.1.1 Renovating and 
equipping 
Fisheries and 
Coastal 
Research 
Laboratory
467,239.61 83,113.00 40,384.72 73,316.28 39,000.00 703,053.61 12.78
1.1.2 Refurbishing 
and equipping 
offices of 
academic staff
306,280.36 1,624.92 42,660.44 6,958.96 6,200.00 363,724.68 6.61
143 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Project 
Outputs
Activity 
No.
Activity 
Description
FY 2015
Budget
FY 2016 
Budget
FY 2017
Budget
FY 2018
Budget
FY 2019
Budget
TOTAL 
(US$)
% 
Budget
1.1.3 Acquisition of 
vehicles to 
support 
educational, 
training, 
research and 
extension 
activities
238,549.95 60,298.11 26,650.00 75,570.88 30,034.21 431,103.15 7.84
SUB-TOTAL ########### 145,036.03 109,695.16 155,846.12 75,234.21 1,497,881.44 27.2
Project 
Output 1.2
1.2.1 Academic and 
technical staff 
capacity 
strengthening 
5,000.00 36,856.00 52,880.00 26,420.00 34,500.00 155,656.00 2.83
1.2.2 Operationalizin
g of the Centre 
for Coastal 
Management
31,924.00 60,843.34 60,374.63 31,074.63 51,114.55 235,331.16 4.28
1.2.3 Support for 
postgraduate 
(M. Phil. and 
PhD) training 
program
14,400.00 150,300.00 235,405.00 293,742.21 139,012.63 832,859.84 15.14
1.2.4 Undergraduate 
research grants 
& J-Term 
exchange 
program
3,850.00 16,000.00 14,500.00 61,020.00 74,500.00 169,870.00 3.09
SUB-TOTAL 55,174.00 263,999.34 363,159.63 412,256.84 299,127.18 1,393,717.00 25.3
Project 
Output 2.1
2.1.1 Conducting 
fisheries stock 
assessment
- 53,998.00 40,000.00 22,000.00 29,000.00 144,998.00 2.64
2.1.2 Conducting 
research and 
- 50,000.00 50,000.00 45,000.00 79,000.00 224,000.00 4.07
144 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Project 
Outputs
Activity 
No.
Activity 
Description
FY 2015
Budget
FY 2016 
Budget
FY 2017
Budget
FY 2018
Budget
FY 2019
Budget
TOTAL 
(US$)
% 
Budget
assessment on 
marine fisheries 
governance 
issues 
2.1.3 Research on 
fish and shellfish 
of commercial 
value
- 15,000.00 8,000.00 16,000.00 16,000.00 55,000.00 1.00
2.1.4 Analysis of 
value chains of 
fish trade
- - - 4,000.00 4,000.00 8,000.00 0.15
2.1.5 Monitor the 
biodiversity and 
health of 
coastal 
ecosystems
- 8,000.00 8,000.00 12,000.00 26,800.00 54,800.00 1.00
2.1.6 Developing 
marine and 
coastal fisheries 
database
14,321.95 30,000.00 20,000.00 18,000.00 20,000.00 102,321.95 1.86
SUB-TOTAL 14,321.95 156,998.00 126,000.00 117,000.00 174,800.00 589,119.95 10.7
Project 
Output 2.2
2.2.1 Developing 
material and 
conducting 
training on 
integrated 
coastal 
management 
- 20,000.00 30,000.00 15,000.00 30,000.00 95,000.00 1.73
2.2.2 Developing 
material and 
conducting 
training on 
fisheries 
management
- 20,000.00 40,000.00 15,000.00 30,000.00 105,000.00 1.91
145 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Project 
Outputs
Activity 
No.
Activity 
Description
FY 2015
Budget
FY 2016 
Budget
FY 2017
Budget
FY 2018
Budget
FY 2019
Budget
TOTAL 
(US$)
% 
Budget
2.2.3 Developing 
manuals and 
updating 
training 
materials on 
climate change 
adaptation and 
mitigation 
50,000.00 35,000.00 30,000.00 15,000.00 30,000.00 160,000.00 2.91
2.2.4 Developing 
material and 
conducting 
training on the 
use and 
application of 
Geographic 
Information 
Systems (GIS)
- 42,500.00 58,000.00 38,000.00 50,000.00 188,500.00 3.43
2.2.5 Engaging policy 
makers to 
address coastal 
and fisheries 
issues
38,000.00 69,500.00 69,500.00 50,500.00 - 227,500.00 4.14
2.2.6 Building 
institutional 
partnerships 
and 
collaboration
40,500.00 - - - - 40,500.00 0.74
2.2.7 Wetlands 
ecological 
health 
monitoring 
using school 
clubs and 
communities
- 20,000.00 30,000.00 24,000.00 - 74,000.00 1.35
146 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Project 
Outputs
Activity 
No.
Activity 
Description
FY 2015
Budget
FY 2016 
Budget
FY 2017
Budget
FY 2018
Budget
FY 2019
Budget
TOTAL 
(US$)
% 
Budget
2.2.8 Strengthening 
community￾based groups
30,000.00 40,000.00 10,600.00 10,000.00 - 90,600.00 1.65
2.2.9 Promoting 
supplementary 
livelihoods in 
coastal 
communities
20,000.00 60,000.00 49,400.00 30,741.40 - 160,141.40 2.91
SUB-TOTAL 178,500.00 307,000.00 317,500.00 198,241.40 140,000.00 1,141,241.40 20.8
TOTAL 
EXPENDITURE 
(US$) 1,385,197.16 1,015,437.33 1,098,289.49 1,098,662.96 902,249.64 5,499,836.58 100.00
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator Noble K. Asare, February 1, 2020
Table 35. Partial List of Other Universities and Research Institutions That Have Used the FCMCBSP-funded Laboratory Facilities, FY 
2015-FY 2020
S/N Department118
1 Conservation Biology and Entomology
2 Biochemistry
3 Environmental Science
4 Laboratory Technology
5 Biomedical Sciences
6 School of Agricultural Sciences 
7 Chemistry
8 Physics
9 Molecular Biology and Biotechnology
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, February 16, 2020
118 In our records no other university or research institution besides sister departments in UCC have used the laboratory facilities. However, below is the list of departments in 
the university who access the fisheries and coastal research laboratory.
147 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 36. List of Faculty and Staff Who Received Academic and Technical Capacity-Building (FY 2015-FY 2019) - Total Expenditure (US$ 
165,656.00)
No. Name of Staff Sex Staff 
Category
UCC Job 
Title Project Role
Description of 
Capacity-Building 
Activity/Focus
Impact
1
Prof. Denis W. 
Aheto M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS)
Associate 
Professor, 
Director 
(CCM)
Project 
Manager
Maritime security and 
enforcement, project
management training, 
Proposal writing and 
grantsmanship
Enhanced teaching and research 
capacity in maritime law and 
enforcement at the postgraduate level, 
Leadership to manage other Donor 
funds including the World Bank 
ACECoR Project, Securing two maiden 
Centers of Excellence (World Bank 
ACECoR; AU Africa Centre of 
Excellence in Fisheries and Aquaculture) 
at UCC.
2 Dr. Noble K Asare M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS)
Senior 
Lecturer, HoD 
(DFAS)
Project M&E 
Coordinator
Climate change 
adaptation and 
mitigation in coastal 
areas*, Proposal writing 
and grantsmanship
Introduction and teaching of one (1) 
undergraduate course and one (1) 
postgraduate course in Climate Change 
(from 2019/2020 academic year) in a 
revised curricula of DFAS, development 
and running of one (1) short course in 
climate change adaptation by CCM, 
Securing two maiden Centers of 
Excellence (World Bank ACECoR; AU 
Africa Centre of Excellence in Fisheries 
and Aquaculture) at UCC, revision and 
improvement in strategic plan, and 
introduction of business plan for DFAS
3
Prof. Kobina 
Yankson M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS) Professor
Member, 
Project 
Management 
Board
Climate change 
adaptation and 
mitigation in coastal 
areas*
Introduction of one (1) undergraduate 
course and one (1) postgraduate course 
in Climate Change in the revised 
curricula of DFAS being implemented 
from 2019/2020 academic year, 
development and running of one short 
course in climate change adaptation by 
CCM.
148 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
No. Name of Staff Sex Staff 
Category
UCC Job 
Title Project Role
Description of 
Capacity-Building 
Activity/Focus
Impact
4 Prof. John Blay M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS) Professor
Member, 
Project 
Management 
Board
Maritime security and 
enforcement, Use of 
analytical instruments
Enhanced teaching and research 
capacity at DFAS in areas of maritime 
law and enforcement at the 
postgraduate level Integrated Coastal 
Zone Management Programs
5 Prof. Edward Obodai M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS) Professor -
Water quality 
management in oyster 
culture*
Improved research, teaching and culture 
in shellfish aquaculture
6
Prof. Josepth 
Aggrey-Fynn M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS)
Associate 
Professor, 
Vice Dean
-
Fish growth and ageing 
techniques*
Improved teaching and research the use 
of fish ageing techniques in fish stock 
assessment
7
Dr. Emmanuel 
Acheampong M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS) Lecturer -
Climate change 
adaptation and 
mitigation in coastal 
areas*
Introduction and teaching of one (1) 
undergraduate course and one (1) 
postgraduate course in Climate Change 
(from 2019/2020 academic year) in a 
revised curricula of DFAS, development 
and running of one (1) short course in 
climate change adaptation by CCM.
8 Dr. Isaac Okyere M
Academic 
Staff (DFAS) Lecturer -
Maritime security and 
enforcement
Enhanced teaching and research 
capacity at DFAS in areas of maritime 
law and enforcement at the 
postgraduate level Integrated Coastal 
Zone Management Programs
9 Dr. Precious Mattah M
Academic 
Staff (CCM)
Senior 
Research 
Fellow 
-
Proposal writing and 
grantsmanship
Securing a Centre of Excellence (World 
Bank Africa Centre of Excellence in 
Coastal Resilience)
10 Dr. Donatus 
Angnuureng M
Academic 
Staff (CCM)
Research 
Fellow -
Proposal writing and 
grantsmanship
Securing a Centre of excellence (World 
Bank African Centre of Excellence in 
Coastal Resilience)
11 Ms. Esinam Attipoe F
Project 
Support 
Group
Project 
Management 
Support
Project 
Management 
Support
Project and program 
management
New knowledge and skills for future 
project management
149 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
No. Name of Staff Sex Staff 
Category
UCC Job 
Title Project Role
Description of 
Capacity-Building 
Activity/Focus
Impact
12 Mr. Prosper 
Dordunu M Technical Staff
Senior 
Laboratory 
Technologist 
(DFAS)
-
Operations and 
maintenance of 
laboratory analytical 
instruments*, 
Laboratory health and 
safety*
Improved laboratory operation and 
management through the drafting of lab 
management documents (e.g. lab 
management policies), ISO accreditation 
documents, and introduction of 
laboratory management software.
13 Mr. Thomas Davis M Technical Staff
Principal 
Laboratory 
Technician 
(DFAS)
-
Operations and 
maintenance of 
laboratory analytical 
instruments*, 
Laboratory health and 
safety*
Improved laboratory operation and 
management through the drafting of lab 
management documents (e.g. lab 
management policies), ISO accreditation 
documents, and introduction of 
laboratory management software.
14 Ms. Margaret 
Winwah F
Administrative 
Staff
Chief 
Administrative 
Assistant 
(DFAS)
-
Training on modern 
administrative 
procedures (including 
electronic filing system, 
administrative planning 
and communication)119
Improved and effective use of ICT in 
administrative management
15 Mr. Kwabena Owusu M Finance Senior 
Accountant
Project 
Finance 
Officer
Financial reporting and 
auditing for donor 
funded projects
Improved financial management of 
donor funds
16 Mr. Ernest Nyan M Audit Internal 
Auditor, UCC -
Financial reporting and 
auditing for donor 
funded projects
Improved financial management of 
donor funds
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator Noble Asare, January 23, 2020
119 In partnership with USAID SFMP, Coastal Resources Center, URI, USA
150 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 37. List of Courses and Programs Revised Through Direct or Indirect Support from FCMCBSP
No. Programs/Courses Description
1 Integrated Coastal Zone Management New modular postgraduate program120
2 Fisheries Science New modular postgraduate program
3 Oceanography and Limnology New modular postgraduate program
4 Introduction to Ecological Modeling Revised undergraduate course
121
5 Petroleum Ecology Revised undergraduate course
6 Introduction to Issues in Climate Change New undergraduate course
7 Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation in 
Coastal Areas
Newly postgraduate course
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Coordinator Noble Asare, Revised October 9, 2020
Table 38. List of DFAS Students Supported for M.Phil. and Ph.D. by Category of Finance, Year, and Source of Finance (FY 2014-FY 2019)
Student Sex Degree
Month/ 
Year 
Graduating
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
14-15122
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
15-16
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
16-17
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
17-18
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
18-19
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
19-20
FCMCBSP 
Activity 
Worked 
On/ 
Working 
On123
Employment 
or 
Employment 
Prospects 
1 Male Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.3 Regular Job
2 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.3 Prospecting
3 Female Ph.D. Graduated F-F F-F F-F 2.1.3 Prospecting
4 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.5 Temporary Job
5 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.5 Regular Job
6 Male Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.5 Deceased
120 Existing postgraduate programs in DFAS were revised into modules to accommodate new concepts as well as meet the requirements of ACECoR. The modular programs 
were designed for M.Phil. and Ph.D. students
121 As a requirement from the National Accreditation Board, all programs must be revised every five (5) years. 
122 S-P -SMFP Partial Award (these are the two SFMP-funded students); F-P=FCMCBSP partial award; F-F FCMCBSP full award; Self (self funded); WB-P (World Bank partial 
award); WB-F (World Bank full award)
123 2.1.1. Fisheries stock assessment; 2.1.2. Marine fisheries governance issues; 2.1.3. Fish and Shellfish of commercial value; 2.1.4. Value chains of fish trade; 2.1.5. Biodiversity and 
health of coastal ecosystem.
151 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Student Sex Degree
Month/ 
Year 
Graduating
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
14-15122
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
15-16
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
16-17
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
17-18
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
18-19
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
19-20
FCMCBSP 
Activity 
Worked 
On/ 
Working 
On123
Employment 
or 
Employment 
Prospects 
7 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.1 Prospecting
8 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.3 Regular Job
9 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.5 Regular Job
10 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.4 Prospecting
11 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-P/ S-P F-P/ S-P F-P/ S-P 2.1.5 Prospecting
12 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-P/ S-P F-P/ S-P F-P/ S-P 2.1.3 Prospecting
13 Male Ph.D. March 2020 F-P F-P F-P 2.1.3 Regular Job
14 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-F F-F F-F 2.1.5 Unemployed
15 Male Ph.D. March 2020 F-P F-P F-P 2.1.3 Unemployed
16 Female Ph.D. March 2020 F-P F-P F-P 2.1.5 Unemployed
17 Female M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.3 Unemployed
18 Female M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Prospecting
19 Male M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Prospecting
20 Male M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.5 Prospecting
21 Female M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.2 Unemployed
22 Male M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.5 Unemployed
23 Male M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.3 Unemployed
24 Male M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.5 Unemployed
25 Female M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.3 Unemployed
26 Female M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.3 Unemployed
27 Male M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.3 Prospecting
28 Male M.Phil. March 2020 F-F F-F 2.1.3 Withdrawn
29 Female M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Prospecting
152 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Student Sex Degree
Month/ 
Year 
Graduating
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
14-15122
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
15-16
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
16-17
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
17-18
Funding
Year 
and 
Source
18-19
Funding
Year 
and 
Source 
19-20
FCMCBSP 
Activity 
Worked 
On/ 
Working 
On123
Employment 
or 
Employment 
Prospects 
30 Female M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Regular Job
31 Female M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Regular Job
32 Female M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.2 Postgraduate 
Studies
33 Female M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.2 Regular Job
34 Male M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.2 Unemployed
35 Male M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Temporary job
36 Male M.Phil. Graduated F-F F-F 2.1.3 Consulting
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, January 9, 2020 
Table 39. Evolution of DFAS Faculty, Course Loads, and Participation in FCMCBSP Activities
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
1 April 2009 1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
21 23
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Senior Lecturer Senior Lecturer Associate 
Professor
Associate 
Professor
Associate 
Professor
Associate 
Professor
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
2/0 1/1 3/5
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
2 2 8
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
DFAS Chair, 
Project 
Manager
DFAS Chair, 
Project 
Manager
CCM Director, 
Project 
Manager 
CCM 
Director, 
CCM 
Director, 
CCM 
Director, 
153 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
the department 
(write out)
Project 
Manager 
Project 
Manager 
Project 
Manager 
2 December 
2010
1. Courses taught
(total number for 
the academic year)
21.5 34.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Lecturer Lecturer Senior Lecturer Senior 
Lecturer
Senior 
Lecturer
Senior 
Lecturer
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
0/0 2/0 3/2 3/2 2/2 0/3
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
0 2 5 5 4 3
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
DFAS Exams 
Officer, M&E 
Coordinator
DFAS Exams 
Officer, M&E 
Coordinator
DFAS Chair, 
M&E 
Coordinator
DFAS Chair, 
M&E 
Coordinator
DFAS Chair, 
M&E 
Coordinator
DFAS Chair, 
M&E 
Coordinator
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
7 7 7 7 7 7
3 October 
1978
1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
20.5 7.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Professor Professor Professor Professor Professor Professor
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
1/0 1/2 2/4
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
1 3 6
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
154 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
the department 
(write out)
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
6 6 6 6 6 5
4 July 1986 1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
24
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Professor Professor Professor Professor Professor Professor
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
2/3 3/7
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
5 10
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
6 6 6 6 6 5
5 January 
2005
1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
15 18.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Professor Professor Professor Professor Professor Professor
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
1/0 1/0 3/2
155 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
1 1 5
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
4 4 4 4 4 4
6 October 
2002
1. Courses taught 
(total number of 
credits for the 
academic year)
22.5 13.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Senior Lecturer Senior Lecturer Associate 
Professor
Associate 
Professor
Associate 
Professor
Associate 
Professor
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
1/0 1/1 2/4
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
1 2 6
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
Director, 
Institute of Oil 
and Gas 
Studies, UCC
Director, 
Institute of Oil 
and Gas 
Studies, UCC
Director, 
Institute of Oil 
and Gas 
Studies, UCC
Vice Dean Vice Dean Vice Dean
6. Level of 
involvement in
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
4 4 4 4 4 4
7 April 2016 1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
- 41
156 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
2. Tenure/Active 
status
- Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
1/1
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
2
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
Seminar 
Coordinator
Seminar 
Coordinator
Academic 
Coordinator, 
ACECoR
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
5 5 5 5
8 December 
2012
1. Courses taught
(total number for 
the academic year)
18.5 37.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer Lecturer
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
2/0 2/1 2/3
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
2 3 5
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
- - DFAS Exams 
Officer
Dept. Reg. & 
Exams Officer
Dept. Reg. & 
Exams Officer
Dept. Reg. & 
Exams Officer
6. Level of 
involvement in 
5 5 5 5 5 5
157 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
9 June 2018 1. Courses taught
(total number for 
the academic year)
24.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
- - - - Lecturer Lecturer
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
- - - - - -
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
- - - - 5 5
10 September 
2019
1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
- - - - - 4.5
2. Tenure/Active 
status
- - - - - Lecturer
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
- - - - - -
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
- - - - - -
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
- - - - - Seminar 
Coordinator
158 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Professor Year 
Hired Work Load 2014-2015 2015-2016 2016-2017 2017-2018 2018-2019 2019-2020
the department 
(write out)
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
- - - - - 5
11 July 2004 1. Courses taught 
(total number for 
the academic year)
18
2. Tenure/Active 
status
3. # of M.Phil./Ph.D. 
students supervised
4. # Student 
committees 
appointed to
5. Other 
responsibilities in 
the department 
(write out)
Reg. Officer Reg. Officer Reg. Officer Academic 
Advisor
Academic 
Advisor
Academic 
Advisor
6. Level of 
involvement in 
FCMCBSP activities 
(1-7)
4 4 4 4 4 4
Source: FCMCBS M&E Coordinator Noble Asare, February 17, 2020
159 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 40. Number of Students by Year, Institution, and Department That Received FCMCBSP-funded Undergraduate Research Grants, 
FY 2014- present
Institution Department AY124
14-15
AY 
15-16
AY 
16-17
AY 
17-18
AY 
18-19
Total Who Got 
Fellowships
Total Number Who 
Responded to Follow-up 
Survey
UCC DFAS 7 32 7 27 7 80 20
KNUST Department of Fisheries and 
Watershed Management
- 5 5 11 7 28 2
UG Department of Marine & Fisheries 
Sciences
- - - - 5 5 1
UDS Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Resources Management
- 5 5 5 5 20 11
UENR Department of Fisheries and 
Water Resources
- 5 5 5 4 19 6
Total 42 22 48 28 152 40
Source: FCMCBSP Evaluation Survey for Student Beneficiaries, January 23, 2020.
124 AY= Academic Year
160 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 41. Current Employment of Undergraduate and Graduate Students Who Benefitted from FCMCBSP125
Undergraduate 
UCC
Undergraduate 
Other Four
Universities126
Undergraduate 
Total
Graduate 
UCC
Graduate 
Other Four
Universities
Graduate 
Total
Type of Employer
Producer Organizations 0 0 0 0 0 0
Commercial Enterprises 0 2 2 0 0 0
Government—National 4 2 6 0 0 0
Government—
Regional/District
1 0 1 3 0 3
International NGO 0 0 0 1 0 1
Local NGO 0 1 1 1 0 1
Donor-funded project 0 0 0 1 0 1
Graduate School 4 4 8 3 0 3
Free-lance consultant 0 0 0 0 0 0
Unemployed 5 9 14 5 0 5
Other 4 0 4 1 0 1
Type of employment
Aquaculture 2 3 5 3 0 3
Fisheries 0 5 5 3 0 3
Coastal Management 4 0 4 5 0 5
Oceanography/Limnology 2 0 2 2 0 2
Other 10 11 21 2 0 2
Source: FCMCBSP Evaluation Survey for Student Beneficiaries, January 23, 2020.
125 Methodology: The tracer study was designed using Google Forms and the link to the survey sent to all present and past students of DFAS. The primary channel of 
communication was email although other channels including WhatsApp groups and the DFAS Facebook page were employed in the dissemination of the survey. The exercise 
lasted from November 2019 to January 2020 targeting Alumni groups between 2006 and 2019. The feedbacks collated through the Google form was converted to Excel and 
analyzed.
126 UG, UENR, UDS, and KNUST.
161 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 42. Number of DFAS Students Who Graduated from 2006 to 2019 
Year BSc. M.Phil. Ph.D.
2006 44
2007 52 1
2008 33 1
2009 43
2010 28
2011 39 3
2012 27 2
2013 17 2
2014 21 3 1
2015 8 1
2016 31 4 1
2017 7 6
2018 27 2
2019 9* 1
Source: FCMCBSP Evaluation Survey for Student Beneficiaries, January 23, 2020.
Table 43. Summary of Materials Posted on FCMCBSP-sponsored FishCoMGhana Online Database (January 2017 – February 2020)
Reports Abstract Journal 
Articles
(links)
Downloadable 
Documents
Total Materials and 
Comments on the 
Category
Aquaculture 1 51 13 38 52
Aquatic ecosystems 0 68 38 30 68
Capture fisheries 2 105 44 61 103
Coastal zones 0 62 27 29 62
Oceanography and limnology 0 5 0 5 5
162 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Socio-ecological systems 0 2 1 1 2
Total 292
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, February 1, 2020
Table 44. Top 10 Countries That Access FishCoMGhana
S/N Country Users % Users
1. Ghana 2,331 44.99%
2. United States 897 17.31%
3. Japan 221 4.27%
4. France 150 2.90%
5. Brazil 118 2.28%
6. Indonesia 112 2.16%
7. Nigeria 104 2.01%
8. India 97 1.87%
9. China 92 1.78%
10. United Kingdom 75 1.45%
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, February 1, 2020
Table 45. User Category and Access to FishCoMGhana (Dated February 16, 2020)
User Category Number
Number of Users 5,179
One-Time Users 5,138
Returning Visitors 636
Downloads 961
Outbound-link 569
Page Views 13,897
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, February 16, 2020
163 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 46. Total Number of FCMCBSP-sponsored Short-term Trainings By Year and Category of Training, FY 2015-present
Year Course Male Female Total127
2015 Climate Change 26 1 27
2016 Climate Change 12 7 19
2016 Fisheries Management 14 0 14
2016 Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) 11 2 13
2016 Introductory GIS 4 5 9
2017 Climate Change 19 15 34
2017 Fisheries Management 8 3 11
2017 ICZM 7 7 14
2017 Introductory GIS 9 5 14
2017 Intermediate GIS 16 9 25
2017 Training of Journalists 9 12 21
2018 Fisheries Management 14 7 21
2019 Climate Change 25 7 32
2019 Fisheries Management 11 7 18
2019 ICZM 25 8 33
2019 Introductory GIS 31 4 35
2019 Intermediate GIS 10 7 17
Total 251 106 357
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey based on project M&E data. January 10, 2020
Table 47. Number and Themes of FCMCBSP-sponsored Workshops, FY 2016-FY 2019 
Fiscal Year Name of Workshop Location (city) Duration Male Female Total 
Number
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Initial Training
Moree, Central 
Region
May 16–18, 2016 19 5 24
127 This figure is a summation of all participants who attended short-term training workshops without recourse to double counting of participants.
164 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Fiscal Year Name of Workshop Location (city) Duration Male Female Total 
Number
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Initial Training
Narkwa 
Community 
Centre, Central 
Region
May 14–15, 2016 12 8 20
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Initial Training
Apam Fisheries 
Centre, Central 
Region
May 26 and 28, 
2016
12 15 27
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Initial Training
Ankobra, Western 
Region
May 24–25, 2016 11 10 21
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Initial Training
Anlo Beach June 12–14, 2016 10 4 14
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Initial Training
Half-Assini 
Fisheries Centre, 
Western Region
May 21 and 23, 
2016
10 14 24
2016 Community-Based Fisheries Management 
Committee Training Workshop
Elmina Central 
Region
June 10 and 18, 
2016
27 9 36
2017 Business Development Training workshop Anlo Beach, Shama 
District, Western 
Region
September 17–18, 
2017
9 2 11
2017 Business Development Training workshop Narkwa, Central 
Region
September 16, 2017 5 11 16
Business Development Training workshop Half-Assini, 
Western Region
September 19, 2017 4 9 13
2017 Business Development Training workshop Ankobra September 22–23, 
2017
5 17 22
2017 Leadership and Management Training Workshop Half-Assini September 18, 2017 4 30 34
2017 Leadership and Management Training Workshop Half-Assini April 28, 2017 3 13 16
2017 Leadership and Management Training Workshop Ankobra April 25, 2017 7 8 15
2017 Leadership and Management Training Workshop Anlo Beach May 4–5, 2017 8 5 13
165 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Fiscal Year Name of Workshop Location (city) Duration Male Female Total 
Number
2017 Leadership and Management Training Workshop Narkwa 
Community 
Centre
May 18–19, 2017 7 20 27
2016 Trainer of Trainers Workshop for Coastal 
Communities Resource Management Committees
Hutchland Hotel, 
Cape Coast
May 4–5, 2016 25 2 27
Total 178 182 360
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey based on project M&E data. January 10, 2020
Table 48. Summary Statistics on the Two FCMCBSP-sponsored Conferences in FY 2017 and FY 2019
FY 2017 FY 2019
Location: Accra Accra
Number of days 3 days (25-27 September) 3 days (19-21 August)
Number of sessions 6 sessions 7 sessions
Number of abstracts 71 69
Approximate number of people 
who attended and any breakdown 
by category of gender
Total = 274
M = 189
F = 85
Total = 262
M = 185
F = 77
Total cost of the conference USD 50,398.09 USD 121,073.13
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, based on project M&E data, February 10, 2020
Table 49. Consultants Used by the FCMCBSP by Institution, Activity, Number of Contracts, and Principal Outputs, FY 2015-FY 2019
Name of 
Consultant
Home 
Institution/Permanent 
Employment Base at 
Time of Consultancy
Fiscal Years Employed Activities Number of 
Contracts Outputs
Dr. George Darpaah Independent Consultant 
(Inchu Airsy Co. Ltd.)
2016 (6 months)
2017 (6 months)
2018-2019 (5 months)
Project Activity 
2.1.2
3 -Three Technical reports
-One Training workshop for 
Journalists
-Validation workshops with 
stakeholders
166 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
Consultant
Home 
Institution/Permanent 
Employment Base at 
Time of Consultancy
Fiscal Years Employed Activities Number of 
Contracts Outputs
Dr. Benjamin 
Campion
Kwame Nkrumah 
University of Science and 
Technology (Iroko Consult 
Ltd.)
2015 (3 months)
2016 (8 months)
2017 (6 months)
2018-2019 (5 months)
Project Activity 
2.2.5
4 -Three Technical reports
-Establishment of FASoG
-Organization of 2 fisheries 
conferences (CFCE 2017 and 
2019)
-Operationalization of JFCoM
Mrs. Cynthia Okine Nature Today/ Forestry 
Commission
2016 (3 months) -2.2.4 only
2017 (1 month) -2.2.3 only
2017 (4 month) -2.2.4 only
2018-2019 (5 months)
Project Activity 
2.2.1, 2.2.2, 2.2.3 
& 2.2.4
5 -Developed training manual for 
GIS
-Trained stakeholders in GIS, 
Climate Change, Coastal 
Management and Fisheries 
Management
-Produced reports on training 
sessions
Mrs. Abena Adubea 
Acheampong
Private Individual 2015 (3 months) – 2.2.8 
2016 (16 months) – 2.2.9
2017 (5 months) – 2.2.9 
Project Activity 
2.2.8 
Project Activity 
2.2.9
4 - Trained coastal community 
members in business 
management
-Trained community members in 
supplementary livelihood 
activities
-Produced reports on training 
activities
- Synthesized Report of 
PLA/PRA
Central and Western Region of 
Ghana
Ms. Anita Takura Private Individual 2015 (2 months) Project Activity 
2.2.3
1 -Trained stakeholders in Climate 
Change short course
Prof. Patrick 
Kwabena Ofori￾Danson
University of Ghana 2016 (8 months)
2016-2017 (6 months)
Project Activity 
2.2.1
2 -Two technical reports on fish 
stock assessment
167 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
Consultant
Home 
Institution/Permanent 
Employment Base at 
Time of Consultancy
Fiscal Years Employed Activities Number of 
Contracts Outputs
Prof. Francis Nunoo Department of Fisheries 
and Water Resources of 
the University of Energy 
and Natural Resources 
(UENR)
2016 (6 months)
2017 (1.5 months)
Project Activity 
2.2.2
1 -Developed a manual on 
Fisheries Management
-Trained stakeholders in 
Fisheries Management
Mr. Edwin Afari World Cocoa Foundation 2015 (1 month) Development of 
Monitoring and 
Evaluation Plan
1 Developed Monitoring and 
Evaluation Plan for the project
Ms. Rebecca Sabah Private Individual 2015 (1 month) Development of 
Gender 
Mainstreaming 
Plan
1 Developed of Gender 
Mainstreaming Plan for the 
project
Mr. Carl Korkpoe Department of Finance, 
School of Business, UCC
2018-2019 (3 months) Project Activity 
1.2.3
1 -Trained students in R software
Drs. Daniel Adjei￾Boateng and Regina 
Esi Edziyie
Kwame Nkrumah 
University of Science and 
Technology
2016 (3 months)
2017 (4 months)
Project Activity 
2.1.5
2 -Two technical reports on 
ecological assessment of Awianu 
lagoon.
Mr. Jacob Ainoo￾Ansah
Private Individual 2016 (3 months) Development of a 
Business Plan for 
the Department 
of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Sciences 
(DFAS) and its 
Newly Created 
Centre for 
Coastal
Management
1 -Developed a business plan for 
the Fisheries and Coastal 
Research Laboratory
Hen Mpoano 2016 (6 months)
2017 (7 months
Project Activity 
2.1.5
2 -Two technical reports on 
wetland monitoring activity
-Trained teachers to facilitate 
168 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
Consultant
Home 
Institution/Permanent 
Employment Base at 
Time of Consultancy
Fiscal Years Employed Activities Number of 
Contracts Outputs
Project Activity 
2.2.7
Computer House 
Technologies
Private Consulting Firm 2016 (5 months)
2019 (3 months)
Project Activity 
2.1.6
2 -Developed the FishCoMGhana 
database
-One progress report on the 
database development produced
-Trained staff on management of 
the database
Dr. Kofi Abban Council for Scientific and 
Industrial Research-
(Water Research Institute)
2016 (6 months)
2017 (2 months)
Project Activity 
2.2.1
2 -Developed training manual for 
Integrated Coastal Zone 
Management
-Trained stakeholders in 
Integrated Coastal Zone 
Management
Dr. Leonard 
Amekudzi
Kwame Nkrumah 
University of Science and 
Technology 
2016 (1 month)
2017 (2 months)
Project Activity 
2.2.3
2 -Developed training manual for 
Climate Change Adaptation and 
mitigation
-Trained stakeholders in 
Developed training manual for 
Climate Change Adaptation and 
mitigation
Mr. Gerard den 
Ouden 
Private Consultant 2017 (1 month) Project Activity 
1.2.2
1 -Trained faculty and students in 
grantsmanship
-Facilitated the development of 
strategic plan for DFAS
Prof. Kwaku Monney 
and Prof. Peter 
Kwapong
Department of 
Conservation Biology and 
Entomology, University of 
Cape Coast
2017 (5 months) Project Activity 
2.2.9
1 -Trained stakeholders in Bee￾keeping and snail rearing
Ms. Pearl Sakyi-Djan DFAS, UCC 2017 (6 months) Project Activity 
2.1.1
1 -Cuttle fish research
169 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
Consultant
Home 
Institution/Permanent 
Employment Base at 
Time of Consultancy
Fiscal Years Employed Activities Number of 
Contracts Outputs
-Report on experimental cuttle 
fish research 
Mr. Isaac Ekow 
Bossman
Private Individual 2017 (2 months) Project Activity 
2.1.1
1 -Cuttle fish research
-Report on experimental cuttle 
fish research
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, January 10, 2020
Table 50. Examples of How SFMP’s IRs and Activities Were Strengthened By Collaboration with FCMCBSP 
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
IR 1: strengthening 
policy enabling 
environment
Activity 1.1 Legal 
reform and co mgt 
meetings
UCC 
participation in 
events
Provided “experts” to 
participate
SFMP paid costs of workshops 
and participant travel per 
diem…hotels
Activity 1.2.
IR 2: please spell out
Activity 2.1
Annual meetings of the 
Scientific and Technical 
Working Groups 
(STWG)
SFMP formed 
and supported 
the work and 
meetings of the 
STWG with the 
group’s chair 
coming from 
UCC. 
Time and level of effort of 
CCM members to the 
team were paid by CCM
SFMP paid for meeting venues, 
transport and per diem 
$8,000
A UCC Professor is the current Chair of the 
STWG, UCC recommended this 
representation be considered institutional, 
rather than based on the individual and looks 
forward to replacing the current individual 
with another UCC representative when the 
time comes. Academic participation in STWG 
makes it a more transparent and credible 
body to provide neutral science-based 
information to decision-makers. A hugely 
170 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
Training of STWG in 
Fisheries Management
Joint Training
CCM provided venue for 
training and conference
SFMP paid for cost of 
conference, transport, 
consultant facilitator etc.
$3,700
important factor in the fisheries sector in 
Ghana, which is highly politicized.
CCM made tangible impacts on the transfer 
of academic knowledge and experience for 
improving the quality of fisheries assessment 
and management. CCM leadership of the 
STWG provided transparency by promoting 
access to information and engaging fishermen.
CCM faculty and staff were provided with 
practical tools to fully engage in the fisheries 
assessment and management. MoFAD and FC 
calls are now seeking CCM’s technical advice.
Activity 2.2 
Trawler Policy 
Roundtables with 
Fisheries Commission 
and UCC
UCC Outreach center 
in Elmina
Coastal Fisheries 
Symposium
Forensic Guide and 
outreach
N/A
Design Support
Joint Program
Joint Program
N/A
CCM supported with 
$20,000
CCM provided students 
research assistance
N/A
SFMP allocated budget for an 
architect but activity was never 
implemented
SFMP supported with $60,000 
for participant costs and venue 
rental and secretariat staff and 
was on org committee
SFMP paid for consultancy by 
UCC faculty and one grad 
student and cost of outreach 
$8,000
Chemical Fishing Guide: 
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&
esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&
ved=2ahUKEwi￾i_yM4ZznAhUtZN8KHR95AnkQFjAAegQIB
hAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fghanalinks.org%2F
documents%2F20181%2F0%2FA%2BPlanners
%25E2%2580%2599%2BGuide%2Bto%2BInteg
rated%2BCoastal%2BManagement%2Bin%2Bt
he%2BCentral%2BRegion%2Bof%2BGhana%2
F5d3f76fd-dbf8-48a1-a3ae￾3cec87f020b3%3Fdownload%3Dtrue&usg=A
OvVaw2E9atukaOD9ld3GItGG1iP
171 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
Activity 2.3 (I believe 
this was a SFMP 
capacity development 
IR7 IR not sci for mt)
Joint SFMP UCC 
Leadership training 
courses – cuttle fish 
collaborative research, 
early adopters and FC 
middle level 
management.
Extension Agents 
Joint Program
CCM grad 
students worked 
the forensics 
guide and also 
outreach and 
training and 
citizen water 
quality sampling 
in the Densu w/ 
oyster 
harvesters
Students also did 
participatory 
research with
fishers on 
demersal stock 
assessment study
CCM provided students 
research assistance
2 Research Students from 
CCM
SFMP paid for cost of US 
training of trainers, part 
costs$34,000
SFMP paid for PHD stipend and 
cost of extension work for 
three years for the 2 student.
$45,000
And Masters stipend for about 
1 year and all research costs 
for the demersal study
CCM faculty and staff are offering similar 
training for local fisheries stakeholders. The 
rate of attendance remains high. 
GIS training for district 
officers
SFMP involved 
CCM and Dept 
Geog in mapping 
work and 
training of 
Not sure if we contracted 
the UCC tech support?
SFMP paid for the trainings and 
with subcontractor spatial 
solutions and Hen Mpoano
172 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
central region 
district officers. 
Training on use of small 
unmanned aerial 
vehicles
SFMP paid for 
URI consultant 
to train UCC 
pilots and how 
to download and 
analyze data for 
helicopter drone 
and a larger fixed 
wing…
SFMP paid costs of UAVs 
given to UCC and costs f 
trainings
CCM has taken over the drone program 
initiated with SFMP support. The drone has a 
five-year life expectancy and was transferred 
to CCM in August 2019. CCM now has three 
certified drone pilots and aims to map all of 
Ghana’s coastal resources. Data and images 
used by students in their research. 
Networking with Western and Central 
Region Land Use and Spatial Planning 
Authority established.
IR 3: National 
conference
Activity 3.1
Activity 32
Etc
IR 4 Applied 
management
Development Action 
Association
(DAA)/DOPA Training 
and outreach for 
development of Densu 
Oyster Co￾Management Plan
Water quality 
testing. Etc. etc.
Co-Management Plan developed. Resource 
user, academia, government NGO 
partnership model successfully demonstrated. 
DOPA women regularly monitoring water 
quality in the Densu Estuary.
IR 7 Capacity 
development
Activity 4.1
Actions research 
between GITA and 
UCC on cuttlefish
Research UCC provided research 
team
GITA paid some costs to UCC, 
SFMP provided tech guidance 
on a tagging study and 
consultants from URI, pad for 
Taught a young faculty member and grad 
students how to do collaborative research 
with fisher folks and engage industry as well.
173 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
tags and tagging guns and a few 
other pieces of equipment
Activity 4.2
Provision of an otolith 
saw for fish age growth 
studies lab
Capacity
development
Provided faculty and staff 
that were trained at URI 
US on aging otoliths and 
cutting prepping samples 
with the saw. 
UCC paid their airfares 
and per diems
URI paid for the saw, UCRC 
expert did in country training 
and organized stateside 
training.
The fisheries age and growth lab supported 
by SFMP is established. Due to student 
demand, space was expanded with shipping 
containers. UCC needs to add specialized 
saws. Faculty and students operate laboratory 
equipment and train new students in the use 
of age and growth techniques. The FC 
retained CCM for ageing tuna samples 
mandated by International Commission for 
the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna (ICCAT)
(International organization)
10 Ph.D. students did a 
semester abroad at URI
Capacity
development
education
UCC paid their airfare and 
stipends
URI organized the mentor 
professors and enhancement 
seminars by CRC
Examples: Following exposure of these 
students to the “R” statistical package for 
data analysis, UCC engaged someone to train 
other students at UCC in “R”. One of the 
URI semester PhD students who will be 
starting as a lecturer at UCC in September 
2019 highlighted how the URI experience has 
shaped her approach to teaching and learning, 
“I am going to force each individual student 
to take measurements. Not as a group. Like 
in my URI practicum statistics class. Each 
student brings a laptop. From start to end 
you are on the laptop. Theory is interjected. 
This is a total flip from what we do, all 
theory. I learned to give the literature 
assignment ahead so that when you meet you 
discuss, not cover the literature. I also saw 
that the types of collaboration among 
professors there are stronger and more 
frequent. I will behave like that in my future –
integrating the disciplines and the approaches. 
“Students improved research and writing 
174 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
skills through training and access to journals 
at URI. 
11 undergrads at URI 
summer two week 
abroad program
education UCC paid student airfares 
and stipends, and Dr. Asre 
accompanied as the UCC 
faculty leader/instructor
CRC paid for local costs of a 
van, and certain fees for events 
and admissions, and staff to act 
as co-trainers
2 Masters 1 PHD 
student
Long-term 
capacity building
UCC on selection 
committee of candidates 
and guaranteed 
employment of persons on 
return from URI
SFMP paid costs of travel, 
tuition and fees, monthly 
stipend, costs for in-country 
research in Ghana during 
summer(s), CRC program 
coordinators and enhancement 
multidisciplinary seminars
https://www.crc.uri.edu/download/GH2014_S
CI045_CRC_FIN508.pdf In general, the 
intense programs of study including required 
courses, extensive homework and rigorous 
research standards were facets of the 
experience at URI that could be beneficially 
transferred and applied to Ghanaian graduate 
education.
One of the URI 2018 Masters’ degree 
students funded under SFMP was on the team 
that drafted the successful ACECoR proposal. 
She and other UCC URI graduates are 
proposed as ACECoR Research Fellows.
On his first day back in Ghana in 2019, the 
new PhD presented his thesis results on the 
sardinella fishery to the STWG. PhD student 
returned to Ghana and is considered for an 
assistant professor position at CCM.
Equipment training on 
use of gas 
chromatograph
training UCC provided faculty/ lab 
tech, travel costs and 
lodging
URI provided a mentor faculty, 
program design at URI and 
coordinated all program 
logistics 
Shellfish Co￾Management: Peer to 
Peer Study Tour to 
Cap 
development
1 UCC female participant. 
Sheila Fynn Korsah.
URI fully funded and 
implemented. 
https://www.crc.uri.edu/download/GH2014_
ACT220_CRC_DAA_TRY_SNV_FIN508.pdf
. Due to UCC participation in-depth 
demonstrations and exchanges on water 
175 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Intermediate Result 
and Numbered 
Activities of SFMP
Types of 
Collaboration
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by 
UCC (in-kind and/or $)
How the Collaboration 
Was Supported by SFMP 
(in-kind and/or $)
Value Added of the Collaboration 
Western Benin Oyster 
Communities
/Applied 
Management
quality monitoring by women themselves was 
led by Ghana oyster managers. UCC 
previously trained the Ghana women and this 
was their chance to demonstrate their 
knowledge and pass it on to others. UCC 
facilitated more analytical discussions of 
observed experience such as the value added, 
cost-effectiveness of wild stock management 
v. mariculture, among other topics. UCC 
participation was integral to demonstrating 
the effective partnership and networking 
models that was one of the key points of the 
study tour: women resource managers, 
academia, NGOs and government.
Prg Mgt 
Activity 5.1
Joint work planning 
meetings
planning UCC usually provided 
venue but rotated Accra 
UCC Takoradi.
We agreed on activities that 
we would jointly do, or an 
activity that would enhance 
what UCC or we were doing 
or CSLP, each of the project 
would clarify role and budget 
contributions then these would 
go into respective work plans. 
Enhanced collaboration based on mutually 
agreed work and needs
Activity 4.2
Source: Deputy Chief of Party Enoch Ebo Appia and Chief of Party Dr. Raymond Babanawo, based on SMFP Product Data, January 23, 2020. And URI/CRC Program Manager 
Dr. Brian Crawford 
176 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 51. Evolution of Donor Funding128 for CCM and DFAS, FY 2014-present
2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
USAID 1385197 1015437 1152289 1098663 902249.6
USAID/SFMP 200000 200000 200000 200000 200000
National 
Geographic
16667 16667 16667
The World 
Academy of 
Science
4470.5 4470.5
Australian 
AID
60000
DANIDA 300000 250000 250000
French 
Embassy
4748.98
Safe Fish 5000 5000 5000
Skills 
Development 
Fund I
175000 175000
Skills 
Development 
Fund II
50000 50000
World Bank 457972 3722218 1148241 759156.8 312412.6
Source: FCMCBSP Communication Support Ernest Obeng Chuku, based on project data, January 23, 2020
128 All figures are in US $
177 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 52. Summary Statistics on the Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management (FY 2018 – present)
UCC UG KNUST UENR UDS
Ghana 
Government 
Institution 
(research or 
other)
Media Other 
National 
International
—West 
African
International
—Outside 
Africa
Unknown
Number of 
issues to 
date
2 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
# Editorial 
board 
members
4 1 0 0 0 0 0 4 1 3 0
Editor/
assistant 
editors (3)
8 editors 
+ 6 
editorial 
assistants
0 2 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0
Total 14 2 2 1 0 2 0 4 1 3 0
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, based on project M&E data, February 16, 2020
Table 53. Overview of Manuscript Turn Around and Decision Time (FY 2018 – present) 
Description Number 
Submitted Articles 25
Published Articles 4
Accepted Articles 4
Rejected Articles 10
Articles under review 11
Overall Decision Time 30 days
Total Download 533 (for all times)
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, February 16, 2020
178 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table 54. Number of Senior Professors at Other Ghanaian and Non-Ghanaian Universities Who Served on FCMCBSP-funded Student 
Committees Since FY 2015
S/N Name of Professor Title, Institution, and Relationship to DFAS and CCM Number of the Students (M. 
Phil./Ph.D.) Supervised
1 Prof. K. A. Monney Department of Conservation Biology & Entomology, UCC
Served as consultant for Supplementary Livelihood Activity to train 
stakeholders
1 M.Phil. 2 Ph.D.
2 Prof. B.A. Mensah Department of Conservation Biology & Entomology, UCC 5 M.Phil.
3 Mr. Ernest Kofi Amankwa Afrifa Department of Environmental Science, UCC 2 M.Phil.
4 Dr. Samuel Kofi Tulashie Department of Chemistry, UCC 1 Ph.D.
5 Prof. Frederick Ato Armah Department of Environmental Science, UCC 2 M.Phil. 1 Ph.D.
6 Dr. Michael Miyittah Department of Environmental Science, UCC 1 M.Phil.
7 Dr. Samuel K.M. Agblorti Department of Population and Health, UCC 1 M.Phil.
8 Dr. Justus P. Deikumah Department of Conservation Biology and Entomology, UCC 1 M.Phil.
9 Prof. Michael Buenor Adinortey Department of Biochemistry, UCC 1 M.Phil.
10 Dr. Benjamin Campion Department of Fisheries & Watershed Management
Faculty of Renewable Natural Resources, KNUST
Served as consultant for Activity 2.2.5 to engage policy makers to 
address coastal and fisheries issues
5 M.Phil.
11 Dr. Berchie Aseidu Department of Fisheries and Water Resources, UENR 3 M.Phil.
12 Dr. Akwasi Ampofo-Yeboah Department of Fisheries & Aquatic Resources Management
Faculty of Natural Resources & Environment, UDS
President of FASoG
1 M.Phil.
13 Dr. George Asare Darpaah Department of Animal Biology and Conservation, UG
Served as consultant for Activity 2.1.2 to research on marine and 
coastal governance issues
1 M.Phil.
14 Prof. F.K.E. Nunoo Department of Marine & Fisheries Sciences, UG
Served as consultant for Activity 2.2.2 to develop training manual 
for fisheries management
1 M.Phil. 1 Ph.D.
15 Prof. Rose E.M. Entsua-Mensah Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) Head Office 1 Ph.D.
179 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
S/N Name of Professor Title, Institution, and Relationship to DFAS and CCM Number of the Students (M. 
Phil./Ph.D.) Supervised
16 Prof. Patrick Kwabena Ofori￾Danson
Department of Marine & Fisheries Sciences, UG
Served as consultant for Activity 2.1.1 to research on Cuttle Fish
1 M.Phil. 1 Ph.D.
17 Prof. Nelson Winston Agbo Department of Fisheries & Watershed Management, KNUST 1 Ph.D.
18 Dr. Daniel Adjei-Boateng Department of Fisheries & Watershed Management 
Faculty of Renewable Natural Resources, KNUST
Consultant on Activity 2.1.5 to research on the biodiversity and 
health of coastal ecosystems with special focus on Awianu Lagoon
1 M.Phil.
19 Dr. Elliot Haruna Alhassan Department of Fisheries & Aquatic Resources Management 
Faculty of Natural Resources & Environment, UDS
1 M.Phil.
Source: FCMCBSP M&E Support Joshua Adotey, February 1, 2020
180 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
ANNEX VI: TECHNICAL REVIEW 
OF THE FCMCBSP MARINE AND 
COASTAL RESEARCH AND 
RESOURCE ASSESSMENTS 
(ACTIVITY 2.1.1-2.1.5) AND MARINE 
AND COASTAL FISHERIES 
DATABASE (2.1.6).
181 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Technical Review of USAID/Ghana’s University Of Cape 
Coast (UCC) Fisheries And Coastal Management 
Capacity Building Support Project Output—Activity 2.1: 
Increased Marine And Coastal Research And Resource 
Assessments
By
Dr. Evans Kwasi Arizi
Prof. Denis Worlanyo Aheto129
129 The authors of this report wish to express their immense gratitude to Della McMillan and Lynn Hurtak for the guidance in 
completing this assignment. The authors are equally thankful to some members of the FCMCBSP team for their insightful 
contributions in the form of comments and provision of documentation in support of this work. The members are: Dr. Noble 
Asare, Head of Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, and M&E Coordinator of the USAID/Ghana UCC Fisheries and 
Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project (USAID/Ghana UCC FCMCBSP); Mr. Joshua Adotey, M&E Support, 
USAID/Ghana UCC FCMCBSP; Ms. Esinam Attipoe, Project Management Support; and Mr. Ernest Chuku, Research Assistant 
on the project.
182 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
1.0. BACKGROUND CONTEXT 
1.1. GOAL OF THE REVIEW
The objective of this review is to document the scientific studies conducted under the five-year (2014-
2019) USAID-supported Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project
(FCMCBSP) and provide an overview of the methods used in the five studies and assessments conducted 
over the period. It is further intended to show how these results have been used and what additional 
data collection work or analyses were conducted or are in the process of being conducted by the 
graduate students (Doctor of Philosophy [Ph.D.] and Master of Philosophy [M.Phil.]) associated with the 
activities.
1.2. ORIGINAL VS. ACTUAL METHODOLOGY FOR THE FIVE STUDIES
1.2.1. Methodology Envisioned: In the original proposal, FCMCBP expected the five research studies 
and assessments (Activities 2.1.1–2.1.5) and online database (FishCoMGhana) (Activity 2.1.6) would be 
executed by University of Cape Coast (UCC) faculty. Once the FCMCBSP contract was signed and 
project activities initiated, however, it became clear the project could not fulfill this intention due to high 
student numbers as well as the huge teaching and research responsibilities of faculty as a result of the 
project. This situation led to the engagement of consultants from sister Ghanaian universities to 
augment local staff capacity at Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (DFAS). There was 
originally also an expectation that the five research studies would strengthen the core organizational and 
human capacity of UCC (PIR 1) by using graduate students and undergraduates to collect some of the 
data for the core or complementary studies. The cost of the consultants and their baseline studies was 
supported in the budget under each study (Activities 2.1.1–2.1.5); the cost of the students was 
supported under the budget for support for short-graduate training (Activity 1.2.3) and undergraduate 
research grants (Activity 1.2.4).
1.2.2. Actual Methodology As It Evolved: When the contract was signed, it became clear that its
language would not compensate the use of faculty time for conducting research. To address this issue, 
the project advertised the consultancies nationally in an open competitive bid (i.e., to open the field to 
other experts in different academic and non-academic disciplines to apply) using the standard UCC 
procurement processes, which required each consultancy team to respond to the terms of reference in 
a proposal with a detailed intention, methodology, and budget for the baseline research and assessments 
of each study. This competitive process resulted in FCMCBSP hiring four teams of researchers to: 1) 
produce three of the five research studies; and 2) design the FishCoMGhana online database (Table A).
Each of these studies had DFAS professors as operational leads (Table A). The postgraduate students 
(Ph.D. and M.Phil.) were supervised by principal and co-supervisors (Table B). Two of the studies—the 
Research on Fish and Shellfish of Commercial Value and the Analysis of Value Chains of Fish Trade—
were led by two senior DFAS professors.
In each of the three consultant-led studies, there was an initial baseline study which produced a report 
that included some of the data (identified in the original Statement of Work [SOW]) needed for a 
specific policy purpose, or in some cases was tied to a very specific policy. The baseline studies by the 
consultants also served as a basis for further research investigations by the students.
183 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
To date, 188 students were involved in the FCMCBSP scientific studies and research assessments—36 
UCC post-graduate students (61 percent females and 39 percent males), 80 UCC undergraduates, and
72 undergraduates from UCC’s sister fisheries departments (Table A); about 30 precent of the 
undergraduate students were female.
130 Out of 36 graduate students, one died (Fredrick Ekow Jonah) in 
the course of his Ph.D. program, one withdrew (Simon Kyei Gyimah), and five Ph.D. students and one
M.Phil. student are on track to complete their work for submission to DFAS. However, all the 
undergraduate students have completed their studies and submitted to their various departments.
Activities 2.1.1–2.1.5 were divided into thematic areas and each graduate student was required to write 
a research proposal centered on one of these areas. Subsequently, students presented their research 
proposals in a series of seminars attended by DFAS faculty members and students. These research 
proposals were constructively criticized and scrutinized by the scientific audience made up of both 
faculty members and students of DFAS and, in some cases, colleagues from cognate departments to 
ensure each student would do quality research. As for the undergraduate students, they chose topics 
from a list provided by their university supervisors. There was no co-authorship among the students as 
far as their dissertations and theses are concerned. 
130 This number is correct but does not match with documentation on the students in this report since the full list is yet to be 
compiled (Pers. Comm. Prof. Denis W. Aheto; February 27, 2020). 
184 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table A. Number of Consultants, Graduate Students, Undergraduate Students,131 and Other Researchers Involved in the Five 
FCMCBSP Increased Marine and Coastal Research and Resource Assessments132
Name of 
FCMCBSP 
Activity (Activity 
number)
Lead Consultant 
and Consultant 
Team and 
His/Her Home 
Institution 
Lead Person Who 
Oversaw This 
Study at UCC
Number and Name of Graduate 
Students Who Worked in the Baseline 
Study and Follow-Up Studies and Status 
of Their Dissertation/Thesis 
Number and Name of 
Undergraduate Students Who 
Worked on the Studies and 
Department and Institution They 
Were Attached To
Conducting Fisheries 
Stock Assessment 
(Activity 2.1.1)
Prof. Patrick Ofori 
Danson133
Prof. John Blay, 
DFAS, UCC
1. Jemimah Etornam Kassah (PS, DS)
2. Michelle Clottey (PS, DS)
3. Miriam Yayra Ameworwor (PS, ID)
4. Eugenia Amador (MS, TS)
5. Paulina Okpei (MS, TS)
1. Emmanuel Sandy Ofosu (UCC)
2. Nana Manso Frempong (UG)
3. Myra Wewoli Wonje (UG)
Conducting 
Research and 
Assessment on 
Marine Fisheries 
Governance Issues
(Activity 2.12)
-Dr. George 
Darpaah (Lead 
consultant)134
-Dr. Benjamin 
Betey Campion135
Prof. Denis W. 
Aheto, DFAS
Justina Annan (MS, TS) Perpetual Adonu (UDS) 
Research on Fish and 
Shellfish of 
Commercial Value
(Activity 2.1.3)
N/A Prof. Kobina 
Yankson, DFAS
1. Lawrence Armah Ahiah (PS, DS)
2. Isaac Osei Kofi (PS, DS)
3. Rhoda Lims Osae Sakyi (PS, DS)
4. Ebenezer Delali Kpelly (PS, ID)
5. Kezia Baidoo (MS, TS)
6. Mercy Johnson-Ashun (MS, TS)
7. William Dogah (MS, TS)
8. Prince Dela Tseku (MS, TS)
9. Bright Asare (MS, TS)
10. Grace Nikoi Olai (MS, TS)
11. Ernest Chuku (MS, TS)
1. Samuel Ayitey (UCC)
2. Francis Bismark Odoom 
(UCC)
3. Michael Yeboah (UCC)
4. Daniel Onwonah-Owiredu 
(KNUST)
5. Adwoa Twumwaah Gyapon 
(KNUST)
6. Richard Appiah-Kubi (KNUST)
7. Freda Sarfo (UDS)
8. Gertrude Dzifa Mensah (UDS)
131 Not all the names of the undergraduate students were captured in this table because, at the time this report was being prepared, some students of the sister universities had 
not submitted their dissertations to DFAS for review.
132 Acronyms for Degrees: PS = Ph.D. student; MS = M. Phil. student; DS = Dissertation submitted; ID = Incomplete Dissertation; TS = Thesis Submitted; IT = Incomplete 
Thesis. Acronyms for undergraduate students’ home institutions: KNUST = Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology; UCC = University of Cape Coast; UDS = 
University of Development Studies; UENR = University of Energy and Natural Resources; and UG = University of Ghana. 
133 Full Professor, Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences, University of Ghana (UG), Legon.
134 Senior Lecturer, UG. 
135 Senior Lecturer, Department of Fisheries and Watershed Management (DFWM), Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi.
185 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
FCMCBSP 
Activity (Activity 
number)
Lead Consultant 
and Consultant 
Team and 
His/Her Home 
Institution 
Lead Person Who 
Oversaw This 
Study at UCC
Number and Name of Graduate 
Students Who Worked in the Baseline 
Study and Follow-Up Studies and Status 
of Their Dissertation/Thesis 
Number and Name of 
Undergraduate Students Who 
Worked on the Studies and 
Department and Institution They 
Were Attached To
12. Simon Kyei Gyimah (MS)136 9. Kwabena Anane (UDS)
10. Peter Bilijobiba Kamonjado 
(UENR)
11. Isaac Awuni (UENR)
12. Gordon Kwame Kuma (UENR)
13. Comfort Adwoa Nyan (UENR)
14. Linda Sarfoah (UENR)
15. Emmanuel Sesi Acolatse 
(UENR)
16. Fred Bissih (UENR)
17. Iddrisu Hardi Tia (UENR)
18. Georgina Anthea Ama Ofori 
(KNUST) 
19. Regina Amissah (KNUST)
20. Foster Afram (KNUST)
21. Evans Owusu-Ansah (KNUST)
22. Pamela Pardie Parnakie 
(KNUST)
23. Goddey Atitsogbui (KNUST)
24. Favour Adedze (KNUST)
25. Owusuaa Afua Asubonteng 
(KNUST)
26. David Attim Abass (KNUST)
27. Amponsah Kwaku Andoh 
(KNUST)
28. Vandyck Owusu (KNUST)
29. Eunice Efua Boahemaa-Kobil 
(UCC)
30. Elizabeth Agyekumwaa (UCC)
31. Alex Asomeni Boateng (UCC)
32. Solomon Tetteh Odjelua 
(UCC)
136 Withdrawn student 
186 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
FCMCBSP 
Activity (Activity 
number)
Lead Consultant 
and Consultant 
Team and 
His/Her Home 
Institution 
Lead Person Who 
Oversaw This 
Study at UCC
Number and Name of Graduate 
Students Who Worked in the Baseline 
Study and Follow-Up Studies and Status 
of Their Dissertation/Thesis 
Number and Name of 
Undergraduate Students Who 
Worked on the Studies and 
Department and Institution They 
Were Attached To
33. Isaac Morris (UCC)
34. Christian Normegbor (UCC)
35. Jacob Zornu (UCC)
36. Bernard Yeboah Assiam (UCC)
37. Evans Davies (UCC)
38. James Akusi Abarike (UCC)
39. Timothy Kow Dawson Amuah 
(UCC)
40. Williams Ofosuhene (UCC)
41. Juliet Afrah Obeng (UCC)
42. (UCC)
43. Kwadwo Appiah-Baah (UCC)
44. Richmond Asante (UCC)
45. Maswud Siba Mohammed 
(UCC)
46. Edna Arthur (UCC)
47. Mohammed Alhassan Kassim
(UCC)
48. Razak Shaibu (KNUST)
Analysis of Value 
Chains of Fish Trade
(Activity 2.1.4)
N/A Prof. Denis W. Aheto Lesly Ntim (PS, DS) 1. Daniel Assan (UDS)
2. Sualisu Abdul Mumin (UDS)
3. Abu Wildan Osman (UDS)
4. Nicholas Darku (UDS)
5. Danquah Isaac (UDS) 
6. Yusif Ansau (UDS)
7. Sumaiya Yakutu (UDS)
8. Benjamin Kettey-Tagoe (UDS)
9. Afriyie Gyamfua (UENR)
10. Melody Abena Anokyewaa 
(UENR)
11. Kwabena Sakyi (UENR)
12. Shammah Akua Agyare 
(KNUST)
187 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
FCMCBSP 
Activity (Activity 
number)
Lead Consultant 
and Consultant 
Team and 
His/Her Home 
Institution 
Lead Person Who 
Oversaw This 
Study at UCC
Number and Name of Graduate 
Students Who Worked in the Baseline 
Study and Follow-Up Studies and Status 
of Their Dissertation/Thesis 
Number and Name of 
Undergraduate Students Who 
Worked on the Studies and 
Department and Institution They 
Were Attached To
Monitor the 
Biodiversity and 
Health of Coastal 
Ecosystems (Activity 
2.1.5.)137
-Dr. Daniel Adjei￾Boateng (Lead 
consultant)138
-Dr. Regina Esi 
Edziyie139
-Dr. Kwasi 
Obirikorang140
Prof. Denis W. Aheto 1. Rebecca Kyerewa Essamuah (PS, ID)
2. Gertrude Lucky Aku Dali (PS, ID)
3. Alberta Jonah (PS) 
4. Elizabeth Effah (PS, DS)
5. Sheila Fynn Korsah (PS, ID)
6. Rahmat Quaigrane Duker (PS)
7. Margaret Fafa Dzakpasu (PS)
8. Fredrick Ekow Jonah (PS)141
9. Delove Abraham Asiedu (MS, IT)
10. Bernard Assiam (MS, TS)
11. Success Adjeley Sowah (MS, TS)
12. Gabriel Gator (MS, TS)
13. Daniel Agyei (MS, TS)
14. Elsie Akushika Debrah (MS)
15. Divine Hotor Worlanyo (MS, TS)
16. Pearl Sakyi-Djan (MS, TS)
17. Nunana Agbemebiese (MS, TS)
1. Priscilla Dzidzor Nego (UDS)
2. Francis Kofi Donkor (UDS)
3. Rakib Karim M. Abdul (UDS)
4. Zainab Mohammed Umar (UG)
5. Kofi Oppong-Mensah (UG)
6. Fidelia Esenam Bandua (UG)
7. Nicole Efua Agyankomaa Otoo 
(UENR)
8. Samuel Twumasi (UENR)
9. Prince Kissi Boadum (UENR)
10. Deborah Addai-duodu 
(KNUST)
11. Wilfred Agbi (KNUST)
12. Elvis Quainoo (KNUST)
13. Delove Abraham Asiedu 
(UCC)
14. Gabriel Gator (UCC)
15. Esther Nyamekye Acheampong 
(UCC)
16. Dominic Duncan Mensah 
(UCC)
17. Florence Dzidzor Fleku (UCC)
18. Irene Owusuwaah (UCC)
19. Fredrick Asante (UCC)
20. Priscilla Mantey (UCC)
21. Benjamin D. Gawornu (UCC)
22. Justice Yeboah (UCC)
23. Richmond Korang (UCC)
24. Fred Kwaku Ahiati (UCC)
137 The studies conducted by the consultants and students under this activity had no connections with any community-based activities. 
138 Senior Lecturer, DFWM, KNUST, Kumasi.
139 Senior Lecturer, DFWM, KNUST, Kumasi.
140 Senior Lecturer, DFWM, KNUST, Kumasi.
141 Passed on (died) in the course of his Ph.D. program.
188 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Name of 
FCMCBSP 
Activity (Activity 
number)
Lead Consultant 
and Consultant 
Team and 
His/Her Home 
Institution 
Lead Person Who 
Oversaw This 
Study at UCC
Number and Name of Graduate 
Students Who Worked in the Baseline 
Study and Follow-Up Studies and Status 
of Their Dissertation/Thesis 
Number and Name of 
Undergraduate Students Who 
Worked on the Studies and 
Department and Institution They 
Were Attached To
25. David Siaw Gyimah (UCC)
26. Richmond Osei Agyemang 
(UCC)
27. Gabriel Takyi (UCC)
28. Justice Nana Bentum (UCC)
29. Martin Bog-Yena Kannyir
(UCC)
30. Maxwell Omane Henneh 
(UCC)
31. Martin Opoku (UCC)
32. Daniel Boakye (UCC)
33. Derek Senam Nutsugah (UCC)
34. Mercy Sekum (UCC)
35. Benjamin Dentu Yeboah Ntow 
(KNUST)
36. Kenneth Appiah (KNUST)
37. Emmanuel Owusu Ansah 
Antoh (KNUST)
Developing Marine 
and Coastal Fisheries 
Database, 
FishCoMGhana 
(2.1.6)
Mr. Robert 
Sewanu142
Dr. Emmanuel 
Acheampong
N/A N/A
Source: Dr. Evans Kwasi Arizi. Collated from FCMCBSP Records; February 15, 2020.
142 Chief Executive Officer, Computer House Technologies
189 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Table B. Graduate Students, Title of Their Studies and Their Supervisors Involved in the Five FCMCBSP Increased Marine 
and Coastal Research and Resource Assessments
FCMCBSP Activities 
(2.1.1 -2.1.5) Title of Study Name of Graduate 
Student143 Major Supervisor Co-supervisor
2.1.1 Conducting Fisheries 
Stock Assessment
Aspects of the biology and 
length-based assessment of 
the Atlantic chub mackerel 
Scomber colias (Scombridae) 
stock off the coast of Ghana
Jemimah Etornam Kassah
(PS)
Prof. John Blay 144 Dr. Najih Lazar145
Population dynamics and 
reproductive studies of 
three commercially 
important sparid species 
from Ghanaian waters
Michelle Clottey (PS) Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn146 Prof. John Blay 
Observations on the 
bottom-set gillnet fishery 
and the biology of selected 
species at three locations off 
the Central Region coast of 
Ghana
Miriam Yayra Ameworwor
(PS)
Prof. John Blay Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn
Stock assessment and some 
aspects of reproduction of 
two fish species in Ghanaian 
waters
Eugenia Amador (MS) Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn Prof. John Blay 
Toward sustainable 
exploitation of penaeid 
shrimps in the Ghanaian 
Gulf: A review of the status 
of the fishery
Paulina Okpei (MS) Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn Dr. Isaac Okyere147
143 PS = Ph.D. student; MS = Master’s student
144 Prof. John Blay is a Full Professor at DFAS, UCC
145 Dr. Najih Lazar is a Technical Advisor at Coastal Resources Center (CRC), University of Rhode Island (URI).
146 Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn is an Associate Professor at DFAS, UCC.
147 Dr. Isaac Okyere is a Junior Lecturer at DFAS, UCC.
190 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
FCMCBSP Activities 
(2.1.1 -2.1.5) Title of Study Name of Graduate 
Student143 Major Supervisor Co-supervisor
Aspects of the biology and 
population dynamics of 
Sphyraena sphyraena, Apsilus 
focus, Cynoglossus senegalensis
in Ghanaian coastal waters
Divine Hotor Worlanyo
(MS)
Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn Prof. John Blay
Assessment and 
characterization of the 
lobster (Palinuridea) fishery 
in Ghana
Sheila Fynn Korsah (PS) Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn Dr. Isaac Okyere
2.1.2 Conducting Research 
and Assessment on Marine 
Fisheries Governance Issues
Assessment of traditional 
governance systems in 
support of artisanal fisheries 
management in the Western 
Region of Ghana
Justina Annan (MS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto148 Prof. Edward A. Obodai149
2.1.3 Research on Fish and 
Shellfish of Commercial 
Value
Crossbreeding of four 
populations of Black-chinned 
tilapia (Sarotherodon 
melanotheron) from Ghana
Lawrence Armah Ahiah (PS) Prof. Kobina Yankson150 Prof. John Blay
A study on the fishery, 
aspects of the biology and 
culture of the West African 
mangrove oyster, Crassostrea 
tulipa in the Densu Delta, 
Ghana
Isaac Osei Kofi (PS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Prof. Edward A. Obodai
Development of PCR-based 
methods for diagnosis of 
fungal infections in cultured 
fish (Oreochromis niloticus) in 
Ghana
Rhoda Lims Osae Sakyi (PS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Dr. Mike Osei￾Atweneboana151
148 Prof. Denis W. Aheto is an Associate Professor at DFAS, UCC.
149 Prof. Edward A. Obodai is a Full Professor at DFAS, UCC.
150 Prof. Kobina Yankson is a Full Professor at DFAS, UCC.
151 Dr. Mike Osei-Atweneboana is the Director at the Water Research Institute (WRI) of Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Ghana.
191 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
FCMCBSP Activities 
(2.1.1 -2.1.5) Title of Study Name of Graduate 
Student143 Major Supervisor Co-supervisor
Aspects of the nutrition of 
the blackchin tilapia 
(Sarotherodon melanotheron)
Ebenezer Delali Kpelly (PS) Prof. John Blay Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn
Utilization of two brackish 
water systems near Cape 
Coast (Ghana) as nurseries 
for juvenile marine fishes
Kezia Baidoo (MS) Prof. John Blay Dr. Noble K. Asare152
Effects of ginger and garlic 
supplements on culture 
performance of blackchin 
tilapia (Sarotherodon 
melanotheron)
Mercy Johnson-Ashun (MS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Dr. Emmanuel 
Acheampong153
Studies on aspects of the 
biology of Clarias gariepinus 
and Heterobranchus longifilis
from river Offin; toward 
their culture development in 
Ghana
William Dogah (MS) Prof. Edward A. Obodai Dr. George Darpaah154
Performance of the black 
chinned tilapia, Sarotherodon 
melanotheron fed different 
formulated feeds in a 
reservoir
Prince Dela Tseku (MS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong
Aquaculture potential of the 
West African mangrove 
oyster (Crassostrea tulipa): a 
case study of the species in 
the Nakwa Lagoon of Ghana
Bright Asare (MS) Prof. Edward A. Obodai Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong
152 Dr. Noble K. Asare is a Senior Lecturer and Head of DFAS, UCC.
153 Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong is a Senior Lecturer at DFAS, UCC.
154 Dr. George Darpaah is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences (DMFS), University of Ghana (UG).
192 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
FCMCBSP Activities 
(2.1.1 -2.1.5) Title of Study Name of Graduate 
Student143 Major Supervisor Co-supervisor
Some water quality 
parameters and aspects of 
reproductive biology of the 
West African mangrove 
oyster (Crassostrea tulipa) in 
two lagoons in Ghana
Grace Nikoi Olai (MS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Prof. Edward A. Obodai
Strategies for optimizing spat 
collection and growth of the 
oyster for its mass 
production in the coastal 
water bodies of Ghana
Ernest Chuku (MS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Prof. Edward A. Obodai
2.1.4 Analysis of Value 
Chains of Fish Trade
Value chain analysis of the 
croakers (Pseudotolithus 
senegalensis and 
Pseudotolithus typus) in the 
Ghanaian fishery
Lesly Ntim (PS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Prof. John Blay
2.1.5 Monitor the 
Biodiversity and Health of 
Coastal Ecosystems
Toward developing a 
decision support system 
(DSS) for prioritizing 
conservation of coastal zone 
ecological spaces in urban 
areas of Ghana: a case study 
of the Fosu Lagoon
Rebecca Kyerewa Essamuah
(PS)
Prof. Denis W. Aheto Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong
Assessment of the health of 
mangrove forests in the 
Kakum and Pra Estuaries in 
Ghana
Gertrude Lucky Aku Dali
(PS)
Prof. Denis W. Aheto Prof. John Blay
Assessment of coastal 
ecosystems in the Greater 
Cape Three Points area 
toward its designation as 
marine protected area in 
Ghana
Alberta Jonah (PS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Dr. Isaac Okyere
193 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
FCMCBSP Activities 
(2.1.1 -2.1.5) Title of Study Name of Graduate 
Student143 Major Supervisor Co-supervisor
Assessment of the ecological 
and human health 
implications of heavy metals 
and microbial load content 
of the Ankobra River, Ghana
Elizabeth Effah (PS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong
Distribution and eco￾toxicological effects of PAHs 
in selected lagoons in Ghana
Rahmat Quaigrane Duker
(PS)
Prof. Edward A. Obodai Dr. Noble K. Asare
Ecological assessment of 
some coastal lagoons and 
estuaries in Ghana: abiotic 
and biotic approaches
Margaret Fafa Dzakpasu (PS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Dr. Emmanuel Lamptey155
Mesozooplankton abundance 
and impact of selected 
human-induced stressors on 
calanoid copepod in the 
marine coastal waters of 
Ghana
Delove Abraham Asiedu
(MS)
Dr. Noble K. Asare Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong
Ecological studies of the 
Fosu Lagoon using remote 
sensing application
Bernard Assiam (MS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Dr. Isaac Okyere
Assessment of water quality 
of three coastal water 
bodies toward the culture of 
oysters in Ghana
Success Adjeley Sowah (MS) Prof. Kobina Yankson Dr. Noble K. Asare
Morphology and 
microstructure of otoliths of 
juvenile fish species from the 
coastal waters of Ghana
Gabriel Gator(MS) Prof. John Blay Prof. Kobina Yankson
155 Dr. Emmanuel Lamptey is a Senior Lecturer at DMFS, UG.
194 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
FCMCBSP Activities 
(2.1.1 -2.1.5) Title of Study Name of Graduate 
Student143 Major Supervisor Co-supervisor
A new tool to improve 
fisheries monitoring, 
surveillance, and control 
capabilities in Ghana
Daniel Agyei (MS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Dr. George Darpaah
Mapping potential fishing 
zones in support of inshore 
fisheries management in 
Ghana
Elsie Akushika Debrah (MS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Dr. George Darpaah
Habitat distribution and 
seasonal abundance of Sepia 
hierredda in Ghana
Pearl Sakyi-Djan (MS) Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn Dr. Najih Lazar
Characterization and 
quantification of litter on 
selected beaches in the 
central region of Ghana: 
toward the management and 
proper disposal of solid 
waste
Nunana Agbemebise (MS) Prof. Denis W. Aheto Prof. John Blay
Source: Dr. Evans Kwasi Arizi. Collated from FCMCBSP Records; February 15, 2020. 
195 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
2.0. ACTIVITY 2.1.1 
CONDUCTING FISHERIES 
STOCK ASSESSMENTS
2.1. BACKGROUND AND ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY 
This activity assessed the status of commercially important fish stocks inhabiting the coastal waters of 
Ghana with an ultimate aim of providing scientific information for making rational and sound policies for 
managing the marine fisheries of Ghana. A consultant assessed the status of some demersal fish of 
economic importance, and some students whose research areas focused on this activity conducted 
independent studies on some commercially important fish species not captured in the consultant’s work 
to produce dissertations and theses.
2.2. OBJECTIVES, ORGANIZATION, AND METHODOLOGY OF THE BASELINE 
STUDY 
The baseline study under Activity 2.1.1 sought to: 
• Identify different measures of effort in the marine fisheries; 
• Determine the most reliable measure of catch per unit effort (CPUE) for the various fleets in 
the fisheries;
• Compare the size distribution of the key fish species with previous records;
• Estimate growth and mortality parameters and exploitation levels of the key species in the 
fisheries; and
• Generate a model for fishery management predictions.
These objectives were clearly stated, measurable, achievable, and relevant to address the research. 
Conventionally acceptable methods were used to achieve these objectives: length-based assessment 
method for estimation of the growth and mortality parameters and the exploitation rates of the fish 
stocks; Beverton-Holt yield per recruit model and surplus production models such as Schaefer and Fox 
models for estimating the Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY) of the fish stocks per fleet.
156 The baseline 
study was conducted over a period of four months (February to May 2016) by Professor Patrick Ofori 
Danson of the University of Ghana (UG), Legon at a cost of $35,714.28. A report of this short study 
was subsequently prepared and submitted on June 7, 2016 to DFAS, UCC. No student sponsored under 
FCMCBSP was involved in this baseline study.
2.3. OBJECTIVE, ORGANIZATION, AND METHODOLOGY OF THE FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES 
2.3.1. Follow-up Studies by the Consultant: A follow-up study was undertaken by the same 
consultant with the primary aim of obtaining reliable results to make rational policies for managing the 
marine fisheries of Ghana. Since the follow-up study was an extension of the baseline study, the same 
156 DFAS. (2016) Mid-term Report on Fisheries Stock Assessment of Some Selected Commercially Important Marine Fish 
Stocks in Ghana. Cape Coast: University of Cape Coast for the USAID/Ghana UCC FCMCBSP. (June) (unpublished 
manuscript). (FishCoMGhana; http://www.fishcomghana.com).
196 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
objectives and methods were pursued to obtain the results.
157 The latter research also covered a period 
of four months (June to September 2016) at a cost of $17,857.14. At the end of the follow-up research, 
a final report was prepared and submitted in October 2016 to DFAS, UCC. 
2.3.2. Follow-up Studies by UCC Graduate Students: The works of the students were supervised 
by experienced DFAS faculty members to ensure quality results were obtained; their methods are 
conventionally acceptable. The detailed description of the research methods and systematic presentation 
of the findings in the various reports produced by the researchers are testimonies of the quality of the 
studies.
2.3.2.1. Fish Species of Economic Importance: Some students sponsored under FCMCBSP had their studies 
centered on fisheries stock assessment with respect to different fish species of economic importance. 
• Jemimah Etornam Kassah158 employed the length-based assessment method to assess the 
Atlantic chub mackerel (Scomber colias) (Scombridae) stock off the coast of Ghana from 
February 2016 to July 2017, and later produced a Ph.D. dissertation which was submitted to 
DFAS in September 2019 under the supervision of Prof. John Blay and Dr. Najih Lazah of the 
Coastal Resources Center (CRC), University of Rhode Island (URI).
• Michelle Clottey159 assessed Bluespotted seabream (Pagrus caeruleostictus), Canary dentex 
(Dentex canariensis), and Pink dentex (Dentex gibbosus) stocks in the coastal waters of Ghana and 
also produced a Ph.D. dissertation, submitted to DFAS in December 2019 under the supervision 
of Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn (DFAS) and Prof. John Blay (DFAS). 
• Miriam Yayra Ameworwor (in prep)160 assessed the bottom-set gillnet fishery with focus on 
some key fish species, and she is in the process of completing a Ph.D. dissertation to be 
submitted to DFAS. Her work was supervised by Prof. John Blay (DFAS) and Prof. Joseph 
Aggrey-Fynn (DFAS).
• The work of Eugenia Amador161 focused on estimating the reproductive capacities, growth,
mortality parameters, and exploitation rates of Golden African snapper (Lutjanus fulgens) and 
Largehead hairtail (Trichiurus lepturus). Her study covered a period of one year (September 2018 
to August 2019) under the supervision of Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn (DFAS) and Prof. John Blay 
(DFAS); it is yet to be submitted as a thesis to DFAS for M.Phil. degree in Fisheries Science.
• Paulina Okpei162 investigated the exploitation rate of penaeid shrimps in the Ghanaian marine 
waters under the supervision of Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn and Dr. Isaac Okyere. She produced a 
Master’s thesis and submitted it to DFAS. 
• Emmanuel Ofosu163 investigated the CPUE of Nile tilapia fishery of the Kakum Lake at Brimsu in 
Ghana. He produced a Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) dissertation and submitted it to DFAS under 
the supervision of Mr. Joseph S. Debrah.164
157 DFAS. (2017a). The USAID/Ghana UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Final 
Performance Report on Fisheries Stock Assessment of Some Selected Commercially Important Marine Fish Stocks in Ghana. 
Cape Coast: University of Cape Coast for the USAID/Ghana UCC FCMCBSP. (FishCoMGhana; http://www.fishcomghana.com)
158 Kassah, J. E. (2019). Aspects of the biology and length-based assessment of the Atlantic chub mackerel (Scomber colias)
(Scombridae) stock off the coast of Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
159 Clottey, M. (2019). Population dynamics and reproductive studies of three commercially important sparid species from 
Ghanaian waters. PhD dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
160 Ameworwor, M. Y. (in prep). Observations on the bottom-set gillnet fishery and the biology of selected species at three 
locations off the Central Region coast of Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
161 Amador, E. (in prep). Stock assessment and some aspects of reproduction of two fish species in Ghanaian waters. Master’s 
Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
162 Okpei, P. (2018). Towards sustainable exploitation of penaeid shrimps in the Ghanaian Gulf: A review of the status of the 
fishery. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
163 Ofosu, E. S. (2018). The Catch per unit effort (CPUE) and length-weight relationship of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) in 
the Kakum Lake, Brimsu. B.Sc. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
164 Mr. Joseph S. Debrah is a Senior Lecturer at DFAS, UCC.
197 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Nana Manso Frempong165 investigated the growth and mortality parameters of flat sardinella 
(Sardinella maderensis) landed by beach seines at Sakumono beach and their implications for 
management under the supervision of Prof. Patrick K. Ofori-Danson (UG). Nana produced a 
B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it to the Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences (DMFS), 
UG in June 2019.
• Myra Wewoli Wonje166 studied the gear diversity and selectivity in the artisanal fishery at Tema 
Fishing Harbor from January to March, 2019. She worked under the supervision of Dr. Angela 
Lamptey (UG) to produce a B.Sc. dissertation. 
2.4. KEY FINDINGS AND QUALITY OF THE BASELINE STUDY AND FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES
2.4.1. Consultant’s Reports: The findings of the consultant’s research, which focused on some 
selected commercially important demersal fish species in the families Carangidae, Sparidae, Sepiidae, and 
Penaeidae, showed that: 
• Most of these demersal fish stocks had modal body sizes below the minimum permissible landing 
sizes enshrined in the Fisheries Act of Ghana, 2002 (Act 625), which calls for stringent 
regulation of the mesh sizes deployed in the marine waters of Ghana; 
• The biomass of the demersal fish stocks in the coastal waters of Ghana was declining due to 
increased fishing effort, supporting the need to institute closed season and create no-take zones 
in the coastal waters of Ghana;
• The MSY estimated for the artisanal, semi-industrial, and trawling fleets in Ghana is an indicator 
of unsustainable exploitation of the demersal fish stocks, which calls for the need to strengthen 
the application of the quota system to the marine fisheries of Ghana; 
• The rate of exploitation of the marine fish stocks in Ghana is ecologically unhealthy because 
these stocks are being exploited unsustainably; and
• Most of these fish spawned from June to September, reinforcing the need to observe closed 
season within this period of time. 
2.4.2. Graduate Students:
• The findings of the consultant’s research were similar to those of Okpei (2018), Kassah (2019), 
Clottey (2019), Amador (2020), and Ameworwor (in prep) who worked on different fish stocks. 
• Ofosu (2018) observed low yield of fish from the Brimsu reservoir in Ghana as a result of 
increased fishing effort. 
• Wonje (2019) observed a variety of gears such as purse seine, beach seine, gill nets, traps, and 
hook and line in the Tema artisanal fishery, and each type of gear had a different selectivity. 
2.5. HOW RESEARCH RESULTS WERE DISSEMINATED 
The findings of the research undertaken by the consultant can be accessed via ghanalinks.org167 (USAID 
portal) and FishCoMGhana.
168 Out of the students’ work, some poster sessions were done: one poster 
(Paulina Okpei’s work) in the 2017 Conference169 and one poster (Michelle Clottey’s work) in the 2019 
165 Frempong, N. M. (2019). Growth and mortality parameters of Sardinella maderensis (Lowe, 1838) landed by beach seines at 
Sakumono beach and their implications for management. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 57 pp.
166 Wonje, M. W. (2019). Gear diversity and selectivity in the artisanal fishery at the Tema Fishing Harbor. B.Sc. dissertation. 
UG, Legon. 35 pp.
167 https://ghanalinks.org/web/ucc-fisheries-capacity-building-and-coastal-management/annual-quarterly-reports
168 FishCoMGhana (https://fishcomghana.com.) is a database for fisheries and coastal governance created by DFAS under the 
USAID/Ghana UCC FCMCBSP. 
169 DFAS (2017d). Book of Abstracts; Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (25 – 27 September, 2017). The 
changing marine fisheries and coasts: challenges and opportunities for changing minds. UCC, Cape Coast. 79pp 
198 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Conference.
170 Two students (Miriam Yayra Ameworwor and Jemimah Etornam Kassah) separately 
presented an aspect of their work at the 2019 Conference. Given the importance of these data, 
publication of the results in refereed journals is encouraged.
2.6. EARLY EVIDENCE OF POLICY IMPACT
The studies have contributed important scientific information to existing knowledge on the biology and 
population dynamics of some commercially important fish stocks in the marine waters of Ghana. These 
studies have also strengthened the need to implement closed fishing season regularly in the marine 
waters of Ghana to reverse the declining trend of fish landings.
3.0. REVIEW OF ACTIVITY 2.1.2. 
CONDUCTING RESEARCH AND 
ASSESSMENT ON MARINE 
FISHERIES GOVERNANCE ISSUES
3.1. BACKGROUND AND ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY
Studies in this area involved a survey of various social issues in fishing communities as well as existing 
adaptive management strategies. It included participatory characterization of coastal communities and 
environments, studies on gender, child labor, and tourism in the Western and Central Regions. The 
studies also looked at the opportunities involved in adopting co-management strategies for managing fish 
stocks fisheries communities. 
3.2. OBJECTIVES AND METHODOLOGY OF THE BASELINE STUDY
The overarching goal of the study was to contribute requisite data for improving the understanding of 
the roles and responsibilities of all fisheries-stakeholders in the fishing industry of Ghana and identify the 
constraints and opportunities at the district and community levels in the governance and management of 
fisheries systems of Ghana. The specific objectives of the study were to:
• Investigate various traditional governance structures or customary social arrangements, local 
governance and decentralization, collaborative, community, and any available community rights￾based management and their legal dimensions;
• Identify various social issues, particularly the role of women;
• Identify and evaluate various management strategies; and
• Introduce, monitor, and evaluate co-management strategies in selected fishing communities.
In achieving these objectives, the lead consultant used mixed methods such as one-on-one interaction, 
focus group discussions, and direct participant observations to gather data. The baseline study171 on 
170 DFAS (2019b). Book of Abstracts; 2ND Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (19 – 21 August, 2019). Fisheries 
and Coastal Governance in Contemporary. UCC, Cape Coast. 75pp 
171 DFAS. (2016b). The USAID/Ghana UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project: Study
199 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
marine fisheries governance issues was conducted over a period of three months (February to April 
2016) by Dr. George Darpaah at a cost of $35,714.28. Originally, the study sought to cover 60 of 189 
landing beaches in seven districts in Western and Central Regions. However, 50 landing beaches in five
districts of the two regions were covered in the baseline study and the rest were covered in the follow￾up study.
3.3. OBJECTIVE, ORGANIZATION AND METHODOLOGY OF THE FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES 
3.3.1. Consultants: In 2017-2018, Dr. Benjamin Campion of Kwame Nkrumah University of Science 
and Technology (KNUST)172 and Dr. George Darpaah,
173 the lead consultant on the baseline study of 
UG, undertook a follow-up study by working in ten landing beaches in two districts in the two regions 
not covered in the baseline study at a cost of $98,521.78. The same objectives for the baseline study 
were considered in the follow-up study (DFAS, 2019). In addition to the methods for the baseline study, 
an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) was flown over each study area complemented by ground-truthing 
to estimate the length of the shoreline and document important landmarks. The final report was 
prepared and submitted to DFAS in January 2019.174
3.3.2. Students: The two students who worked on this project were supervised by experienced 
faculty members to ensure they did quality research and produced quality results.
3.3.2.1. Graduates: Postgraduate student Justina Annan conducted a similar study—using the same 
objectives and methods as the baseline study175—in April 2018 that focused on some fishing 
communities not captured in the studies undertaken by Dr. Darpaah and Dr. Campion. She 
subsequently produced a thesis under the supervision of Prof. Denis Aheto and Prof. Edward A. Obodai 
and submitted it to DFAS in 2019.
3.3.2.2. Undergraduates: Perpetual Adonu, an undergraduate student at the Department of Fisheries and 
Aquatic Resource Management (DFARM), University of Development Studies (UDS) in Tamale,
176
examined the role of women in fish processing in James Town, Greater Accra Region over a three￾month period from February to April 2018. Perpetual produced a B.Sc. dissertation under the 
supervision of Mrs. Sandra A. Atindana (DFARM, UDS) and submitted it to DFARM in June 2018.
3.4. KEY FINDINGS OF THE BASELINE STUDY AND FOLLOW-UP STUDIES
The consultants’ and students’ studies highlight the respective roles of the stakeholders in the fishing 
industry. This information is an important prerequisite to the design of government policies to 
sustainably manage fish stocks with consequent improvement of the livelihoods of the fisherfolk. 
Report on Research and Assessment on Marine Fisheries Governance Issues. Cape Coast: UCC.
(unpublished manuscript). https://ghanalinks.org/web/ucc-fisheries-capacity-building-and-coastal￾management/annual-quarterly-reports
172 Dr Benjamin Betey Campion is a Senior Lecturer at DFWM, KNUST.
173 Dr. George Darpaah, Senior Lecturer at DMFS, UG.
174 DFAS. (2019). Sustained Research in Governance Issues on Marine and Coastal Management in Ghana. Cape Coast: UCC 
for the USAID/Ghana UCC FCMCBSP. https://fishcomghana.com 
175 Justina Annan did an independent study under the supervision of Prof. Denis Aheto and Prof. Edward Obodai. 
176 Adonu, P. (2018). The role of women in fish processing in James Town, Greater Accra Region. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, 
Tamale. 
200 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
3.4.1. The Consultants’ Reports: The two consultants reports revealed ten important findings based 
on their research in two regions in Ghana:
• The fishing industry in the Central Region is generally dominated by the youth; 
• Supplementary livelihoods are generally lacking in the various fishing communities;
• Traditional fisheries governance is closely linked with the behavior of the various ethnic groups 
along the coast of Ghana; 
• The power of a chief fishermen is gradually eroding, and fisherfolk are willing to support the 
Government of Ghana (GoG) to restore the power of chief fishermen to help bring positive 
changes to the fisheries governance in Ghana; 
• The issues of infractions on the traditional authority are perceived as outstanding contributory 
factors to the poor performance of the Ghanaian marine fisheries; 
• Results from the coastline surveys of the study areas showed few communities had sea defense 
structures; 
• Social amenities and services such as places of convenience, portable water, good roads, among 
others are either lacking or generally in various degrees of disrepair;
• The ramshackle nature of buildings near beaches, the structure of seascape, and immediate 
coastal landscapes suggest the coastal areas of Ghana are under severe stresses of both natural 
and anthropogenic origins; 
• Certain by-laws set by the traditional authority (e.g., no fishing on Tuesdays, no fishing 
expeditions on the death of anyone in the community, no unregistered canoe is allowed to use 
the landing beaches, no applications of illegal, unreported, and unregulated [IUU] fishing 
practices) were found to be effective in fishing communities governed by chief fishermen; and
• The majority of the fisherfolk agreed the closed season can be a good management 
action/strategy to properly manage the fish stocks of Ghana only when the illegal fishing 
practices such as light fishing, “saiko business,” among others are discontinued. 
3.4.2. The Students: Annan (2019) and Adonu (2018) revealed that women in the fisheries sector at 
James Town in Ghana are involved in different activities, including fish processing, mongering, and 
trading, but the majority of these women are fish processors who prefer fish smoking to any other 
fishing processing methods.
3.5. HOW RESEARCH RESULTS WERE DISSEMINATED
To date, there has been one poster session on the data at the 2017177 Conference by the consultants 
and one poster session on the data at the 2019178 Conference by Justina Annan. The results of the work 
by the consultants can be accessed via FishCoMGhana179 and ghanalinks.org.
180 Also, one regional and 23 
community debriefings were done through workshops in the Central and Western Regions of Ghana to 
validate the findings of the consultants’ studies. Considering the importance and relevance of these data, 
publication of the results in peer-reviewed journals is encouraged. 
3.6. EARLY EVIDENCE OF POLICY IMPACT
177 DFAS (2017d). Book of Abstracts; Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (25 – 27 September, 2017). The 
changing marine fisheries and coasts: challenges and opportunities for changing minds. UCC, Cape Coast. 79pp 
178 DFAS (2019b). Book of Abstracts; 2ND Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (19 – 21 August, 2019). Fisheries 
and Coastal Governance in Contemporary. UCC, Cape Coast. 75pp 
179 (FishCoMGhana; http://www.fishcomghana.com)
180 https://ghanalinks.org/web/ucc-fisheries-capacity-building-and-coastal-management/annual-quarterly-reports
201 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
The findings have contributed to the need to strengthen fisheries management outcomes and place a 
moratorium on fishing activities in Ghana’s marine waters in a certain part of the year to facilitate 
recovery of the marine fisheries of Ghana.
4.0. REVIEW OF ACTIVITY 2.1.3. 
RESEARCH ON FISH AND 
SHELLFISH OF COMMERCIAL 
VALUE
4.1. BACKGROUND AND ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY
These studies were conducted to examine the biology and ecology of some potentially culturable fish 
species such as black-chinned tilapia, shrimp, and oysters among others, with the primary aim of 
contributing scientific data for promoting the aquaculture industry in Ghana. The principal focus of the 
studies was the growth and survival of juvenile fish in captivity. These studies were undertaken by both 
undergraduate and postgraduate students under the direction of Professor Kobina Yankson, a full 
professor in DFAS at UCC. 
4.2. OBJECTIVES AND METHODOLOGY OF THE BASELINE AND FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES 
4.2.1. Tilapia Production:
• One of the key studies under this activity evaluated the growth performance, survival rate, feed 
conversion ratio, heterosis, heritability, response to selection, and breeding values of four 
populations of black chinned tilapia (Sarotherodon melanotheron) from Brimsu reservoir, Baifikrom 
Reservoir, Weija Reservoir, and the Fosu Lagoon. This study was undertaken by Lawrence 
Ahiah181 and supervised by Prof. Kobina Yankson and Prof. John Blay, all of DFAS. He produced 
a Ph.D. dissertation and submitted it to DFAS.
• Prince Dela Tseku182 examined the performance of the black chinned tilapia (S. melanotheron) fed 
with different formulated feeds in a reservoir from November 2015 to November 2016 for his 
M.Phil. thesis, submitted to DFAS under the supervision of Prof. Kobina Yankson and Dr. 
Emmanuel Acheampong. 
• Mercy Johnson-Ashun183 assessed the effects of ginger and garlic supplements on culture 
performance of blackchin tilapia to find out if these supplements would improve the growth of 
the fish in captivity. Her work was supervised by Professor Kobina Yankson and Dr. Emmanuel 
Acheampong of DFAS and submitted in January 2019 for a M.Phil. degree in Aquaculture. 
181 Ahiah, L. (2019). Crossbreeding of four populations of black-chinned tilapia (Sarotherodon melanotheron) from Ghana. Ph.D. 
dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast. 
182 Tseku, P. D. (2016). Performance of the black chinned tilapia, Sarotherodon melanotheron fed different formulated feeds in a 
reservoir. Cape Coast: UCC DFAS. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast. 
183 Johnson-Ashun, M. (2018). Effects of ginger and garlic supplements on culture performance of blackchin tilapia (Sarotherodon 
melanotheron). Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast. 168 pp
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• Kezia Baidoo184 investigated the fish species whose juveniles mostly utilize some two brackish 
water systems near Cape Coast (Ghana) from November 2016 to April 2017 for a M.Phil.
degree in Fisheries Science. Her work was supervised by Prof. John Blay and Dr. Noble Kwame 
Asare and submitted in November 2018. 
• William Dogah185 examined some aspects of the biology of catfishes (Clarias gariepinus and 
Heterobranchus longifilis) from River Offin toward their culture development in Ghana from 
September 2017 to August 2018 for a M.Phil. degree in Aquaculture. The work was supervised 
by Prof. Edward Obodai and Dr. George Darpaah. 
• Odoom Francis Bismark186 assessed some aspects of the biology and ecology of blackchin tilapia 
in Benya, Brenu, and Fosu lagoons from January to April, 2019; this work was supervised by 
Prof. Joseph Aggrey-Fynn and submitted in June 2019 to DFAS as a B.Sc. dissertation.
• Daniel Onwonah-Owiredu187 investigated the Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) mortalities 
associated with stocking densities in cages on the Lake Volta in Ghana under the supervision of 
Professor Nelson Winston Agbo at KNUST. He produced a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it 
in June 2019 to the Department of Fisheries and Watershed Management (DFWM), KNUST.
• Richard Appiah-Kubi188 examined the response of two tilapia strains to high temperature and 
low dissolved oxygen stress. His work was supervised by Dr. Daniel Agyei Boateng and 
submitted in May 2019 to the DFWM, KNUST for a B.Sc. degree in Fisheries and Water 
Management.
• Freda Sarfo189 assessed the economic impact of replacing fish oil with palm kernel oil in the diet 
of Nile tilapia (O. niloticus) from February to April 2019 under the supervision of Dr. Christian 
Larbi Ayisi. She produced a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it to DFARM, UDS.
• Gertrude Dzifa Mensah190 assessed the economic impact of replacing fish meal with shea nut 
meal in the diet of Nile tilapia (O. niloticus) from February to April 2019 under the supervision of 
Dr. Christian Larbi Ayisi.
• Kwabena Anane191 investigated the use of different doses of normal saline-diluted ovaprim to 
induce breeding in catfish (Clarias gariepinus). His work was supervised by Dr. Akwasi Ampofo￾Yeboah. Kwabena produced a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it DFARM, UDS in June 2019.
4.2.2. Oyster Production:
• Bright Asare192 examined the culture potential of the West African mangrove oyster (Crassostrea 
tulipa) in the Nakwa Lagoon of Ghana from October 2015 to June 2016. During this study, 
oysters were cultured in the wild on coconut shells and their growth and survival rates were 
184 Baidoo, K. (2018). Utilization of two brackish water systems near Cape Coast (Ghana) as nurseries for Juvenile marine 
fishes. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast. 117 pp
185 Dogah, W. (2019). Studies on aspects of the biology of Clarias gariepinus and Heterobranchus longifilis from river Offin; 
towards their culture development in Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast. 117 pp. 
186 Odoom F. B. (2019). Assessment of some aspects of the biology and ecology of blackchin tilapia in Benya, Brenu and Fosu 
lagoons. B.Sc. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast. 
187 Onwonah-Owiredu, D. (2019). Investigating Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) mortalities in cages on the Lake Volta in 
Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. KNUST, Kumasi. 67pp. 
188 Appiah-Kubi, R. (2019). Response of two tilapia strains to high temperature and low dissolved oxygen stress. BSc 
dissertation. KNUST, Kumasi. 47 pp. 
189 Sarfo, F. (2019). Replacement of fish oil with palm kernel oil on growth, feed utilization, proximate composition and 
economic analysis of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus). B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Temale. 60 pp. 
190 Mensah, G. D. (2019). Substitution of fish meal with shea nut meal in diets of Nile tilapia fry on growth, feed utilization and 
economic analysis. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 54pp.
191 Anane, K. (2019). Evaluation of induced breeding of catfish (Clarias gariepinus), using different doses of normal saline diluted 
ovaprim. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 33pp 
192 Asare, B. (2016). Aquaculture potential of the West African mangrove oyster (Crassostrea tulipa): a case study of the species 
in the Nakwa Lagoon of Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast
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regularly determined. The research was supervised by Prof. Edward Obodai and Dr. Emmanuel 
Acheampong, and a M.Phil. thesis was produced and submitted in September 2017 to DFAS. 
• Grace Nikoi-Olai193 also studied some aspects of the reproductive biology of the West African 
mangrove oyster (C. tulipa) in Amisa and Benya lagoons of Ghana from August 2018 to May 
2019. She used histological procedures to study the breeding status of the oysters, and her 
work was supervised by Prof. Kobina Yankson and Prof. Edward Obodai. She has submitted her 
M.Phil. thesis to DFAS. 
• Ernest Chuku194 studied strategies for optimizing spat collection and growth of the oyster for its 
mass production in the coastal water bodies of Ghana. The study was conducted from August 
2017 to October 2018 and supervised by Prof. Kobina Yankson and Prof. Edward Obodai. He
produced a M.Phil. thesis and submitted it to DFAS. 
• Isaac Osei195 examined some aspects of the biology and culture potential of the West African 
mangrove oyster (C. tulipa) in the Densu Delta, Ghana from May 2017 to October 2018; he 
produced a Ph.D. dissertation and submitted it in January 2020 to DFAS.
4.2.3. Clam Production: Adwoa Twumwaah Gyapon196 assessed the effect of Volta clam (Galatea
paradoxa) on water quality and fish growth in earthen ponds. This work was supervised by Dr. Regina 
Edziyie and submitted in May 2019 as a B.Sc. dissertation to the DFWM, KNUST. 
4.3. KEY FINDINGS AND QUALITY OF THE BASELINE STUDY AND FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES
The findings provide important scientific information for promoting the culture of black-chinned tilapia, 
oysters, and clams in Ghana.
4.3.1. Tilapia and Catfish:
• The key findings of Ahiah (2019) include: (1) five hybrids7 were significantly heavier in body 
weight of harvested fish compared to their parental stocks; (2) many hybrids exhibited heterosis 
and had moderate to high heritability; and (3) among the hybrids studied, female Weija × male 
Brimsu were the most suitable hybrids for culture in both fresh and brackish water. 
• Tseku (2016) revealed that feed composed of equal proportions of fishmeal and soya bean cake 
is ideal for feeding fish in captivity. 
• The study of Onwonah-Owiredu (2019) revealed a mortality rate of 48 percent in fish cages on 
River Volta in 2018 as a result of overstocking and poor water quality. 
• The work of Appiah-Kubi (2019) indicated the “Foreign” strain under culture show lower 
resistance under high temperature and low dissolved oxygen levels in Ghana. 
• Sarfo (2019) showed that palm kernel oil is a cheaper source of lipid for Nile tilapia. 
• Anane (2019) showed that ovaprim with 50 percent normal saline induce the catfish (C. 
gariepinus) to breed, and the eggs they spawn have high hatching rate whilst the fry have high 
survival rate. 
• Dzifa (2019) also showed that shea nut meal is a cheaper source of lipid for Nile tilapia.
193 Nikoi-Olai, G. (2019). Some aspects of the reproductive biology of the West African mangrove oyster (Crassostrea tulipa) in 
Amisa and Benya lagoons of Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
194 Chuku, E. (2019). Strategies for optimizing spat collection and growth of the oyster for its mass production in the coastal 
water bodies of Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
195 Osei, I.K. (2019). Some aspects of the biology and culture potential of the West African mangrove oyster, Crassostrea tulipa
in the Densu Delta, Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
196 Gyapon, A.T. (2019). The effect of Volta clam (Galatea paradoxa) on water quality and fish growth in earthen ponds. B.Sc. 
dissertation. KNUST, Kumasi. 74 pp. 
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4.3.2. Oyster Production: The findings of Chuku (2019) provide critical baseline information on the 
suitability of different substrates such as ceramic tiles, PVC, and recycled oyster shells for culturing the 
West African mangrove oyster on a large scale in Ghana. The key findings were: (1) ceramic tiles, PVC 
and recycled oyster shells were more suitable in collecting the spat of the shellfish than coconut shell;
(2) spat of West African mangrove oysters settled profusely on the undersides of horizontally placed 
collectors; (3) spatfall, spat sizes, and growth of the oyster were significantly greater when cultured on 
middle and bottom collectors than on top collectors; (4) dissolved oxygen (DO) and salinity were the 
significant predictors of spatfall, whereas those for growth were DO and turbidity; and (5) Fistubalanus 
pallidus and Ficopomatus spp. were the most deleterious fouling organisms associated with the spat 
collection and culture.
4.3.3. Clam Production: Gyapon (2019) showed clams can be used to improve water quality in 
aquaculture ponds to enhance survival and growth of fish in captivity.
4.4. HOW RESEARCH RESULTS WERE DISSEMINATED
The results of these studies were discussed at the two Conferences on Fisheries and Coastal 
Environment in 2017 and 2019. To date, there appear to have been: (1) one conference presentation on 
one funded study at the 2017 Conference and one at the 2019 Conference; and (2) one poster session 
on the data at the 2017 Conference and two poster sessions at the 2019 Conference. Given the critical 
importance of these studies, FCMCBSP is encouraging the supervising professors to co-publish articles 
on these studies with their students.
4.5. EARLY EVIDENCE OF POLICY IMPACT
The results of these studies provide vital scientific information on how the West African mangrove 
oyster and blackchin tilapia can be cultured on a large scale to enhance the aquaculture industry in 
Ghana. The findings have significant potential impacts on supplementary livelihoods in fishing 
communities, especially during lean or closed fishing seasons.
5.0. REVIEW OF ACTIVITY 2.1.4. 
ANALYSIS OF VALUE CHAINS OF 
FISH TRADE
5.1. BACKGROUND AND ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY
The studies under this activity focused on investigating: (1) the different phases of production, 
processing, and marketing of the different commercial fish species in the country; (2) the factors 
affecting the various stages in the value chain; and (3) the contribution of fish in the diet of various local 
populations. These studies were conducted by one UCC postgraduate student (Lesly Ntim) and some 
undergraduate students from UG, KNUST, and University of Energy and Natural Resources (UENR). 
5.2. OBJECTIVES AND METHODOLOGY OF THE BASELINE AND FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES
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5.2.1. Graduate Students: UCC Ph.D. student Lesly Ntim197 analysed the value chain of the 
croakers (Pseudotolithus senegalensis and Pseudotolithus typus) in the Ghanaian Fishery from January 2017
to August 2018. The main objective of the work was to determine the value chain of the croaker fishery 
in the Central and Western Regions of Ghana due to the high economic value of croakers across the 
coast of West African waters. Data for the study were collected from both primary and secondary 
sources. A structured questionnaire and key informant interviews were employed to gather the primary 
data. Prices of the fish were determined using standard economic valuation methods. Under the 
supervision of Prof. Denis W. Aheto and Prof. John Blay. Lesly has produced a draft Ph.D. dissertation 
that is scheduled for completion in the next six months.
5.2.2. Undergraduate Students:
• Undergraduate students Daniel Assan198 and Sualisu Abdul Mumin199 (UDS), assessed the post￾harvest loss of fish transported from fish landing sites to other areas in Ghana for processing. 
These students produced B.Sc. dissertations under the supervision of Dr. Daniel N. Akongyuure 
(DFARM, UDS) and submitted them in June 2018 to DFARM, UDS. 
• Abu Wildan Osman200 examined the factors responsible for fish spoilage at the market and 
processing centers of Albert Bosomtwi-Sam Fishing Harbour, Secondi in the Western Region. 
He worked under Dr. Daniel N. Akongyuure (DFARM, UDS) to produce a B.Sc. dissertation,
which was submitted in June 2018 to DFARM, UDS. 
• Nicholas Darku201 examined the effects of ginger and garlic pastes as household preservatives 
for fresh Clarias gariepinus from January to May 2019 under the supervision of Dr. Daniel Nsoh 
Akongyuure (DFARM, UDS). He produced a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it in June 2019 to 
DFARM, UDS. 
• Danquah Isaac202 assessed the marketing challenges among traders of tilapia in Kumasi 
Metropolis in the Ashanti Region of Ghana to determine the key constraints affecting tilapia 
traders in Kumasi. The research was supervised by Dr. Akwasi Ampofo-Yeboah (DFARM, UDS). 
He produced a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it to DFARM, UDS in June 2019. 
• Yusif Ansau203 assessed the microbial load on seabream from two local markets in the Kumasi 
Metropolis, Ghana from February to April 2017. He worked under Dr. Akwasi Ampofo-Yeboah 
(DFARM) to produce a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it in June 2017. 
• Sumaiya Yakutu204 investigated the microbial load in some selected smoked fish species in Yapei 
Market in the Northern Region of Ghana from February–April 2017 under the supervision of 
Dr. Akwasi Ampofo-Yeboah (DFARM, UDS). Sumaiya produced a B.Sc. dissertation and 
submitted it to DFARM in June 2017. 
197 Ntim, L. (in prep). Value chain analysis of the croakers (Pseudotolithus senegalensis and Pseudotolithus typus) in the Ghanaian 
Fishery. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
198 Assan, D. (2018). Post-harvest fish loss at the landing site and during transportation at Tema Fishing Harbour. B.Sc. 
dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 34pp. 
199 Mumin, S. A. (2018). Assessment of post-harvest fish losses during marketing: a case study at the Ashaiman Market. B.Sc. 
dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 43pp.
200 Osman, A. W. (2018). Factors responsible for fish spoilage at the market and processing centers of Albert Bosomtwi-Sam 
Fishing Harbour, Secondi in the Western Region. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 46pp.
201 Darku, N. (2019). Effects of ginger and garlic pastes as household preservatives for fresh Clarias gariepinus (Burchell, 1822). 
B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 51pp. 
202 Danquah, I. (2019). Marketing challenges among traders of tilapia in Kumasi metropolis in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. B.Sc. 
dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 61pp. 
203 Ansau, Y. (2017). Microbial quality on seabream from two local markets in the Kumasi Metropolis, Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. 
UDS, Tamale. 47pp.
204 Yakutu, S. (2019). Microbial load analysis in some selected smoked fish species in Yapei Market in the Northern Region, 
Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 56pp.
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• Benjamin Kettey-Tagoe205 studied the chemical composition of processed and fresh skipjack tuna 
(Katsuwonus pelamis) and also conducted a sensory analysis on the fish in Tema, Greater Accra 
Region from February to April, 2017. He produced a B.Sc. dissertation under the supervision of 
Dr. Elliot H. Alhassan (DFARM, UDS) and submitted the work to DFARM in June 2017. 
5.3. KEY FINDINGS AND QUALITY OF THE BASELINE STUDY AND FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES
5.3.1. Croaker Fish Value Chain: The findings of Lesly Ntim capture the main players and their key 
roles in the croaker fishery industry of Ghana. The study describes the most popular methods for 
processing the fish and factors influencing their sale. These findings are relevant for making critical 
management decisions for the croaker fishery in Ghana. The principal findings were:
• The croaker value chain was supported by partners such as credit givers, non-governmental 
organizations (NGOs), policy makers and extension agencies, but weak relationships existed 
among the various partners and main actors in the croaker fishery system; 
• The processing methods of croakers included smoking, salting, frying, and filleting; 
• Filleted croakers had high profit margins; 
• Factors such as operational cost of fishing, type of fishing, and method of selling had influence on 
the sales of croakers; and
• Total monthly income was dependent on the quantity of croakers landed from fishing 
expeditions. 
So far, none of these findings are on FishCoMGhana.
5.3.2. Fish Transport and Conservation:
• Assan (2018)206 and Mumin (2018)207 revealed massive fish spoilage accounts for great fish losses 
in the transportation of fish from fish landing sites to other areas as a result of mishandling. 
• Osman (2018)208 identified insufficient ice for fish preservation and exposure of fish to high heat 
during smoking as the major causes of fish spoilage in Ghana. 
• Darku (2019)209 found garlic and ginger pastes can preserve fish for three days. Danquah (2019) 
found the challenges affecting tilapia traders in Kumasi as high perishability of the product, 
inadequate storage facilities, instability of prices, inadequate power supply, poor transportation 
network, and inadequate capital. 
• Ansau (2017)210 observed high fecal coliform in seabream on sale at two local markets in Kumasi 
as a result of poor sanitary conditions.
• Kettey-Tagoe (2017)211 showed heavily dried smoked skipjack tuna has a good color, odor, 
flavor, texture, and is readily accepted by consumers in Ghana.
205 Kettey-Tagoe, B. (2017). Chemical composition and sensory analysis of processed and fresh skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus 
pelamis) in Tema, Greater Accra Region. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Temale. 47pp.
206 Assan, D. (2018). Post-harvest fish loss at the landing site and during transportation at Tema Fishing Harbour. B.Sc. 
dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 34pp. 
207 Mumin, S. A. (2018). Assessment of post-harvest fish losses during marketing: a case study at the Ashaiman Market. B.Sc. 
dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 43pp. 
208 Osman, A. W. (2018). Factors responsible for fish spoilage at the market and processing centers of Albert Bosomtwi-Sam 
Fishing Harbour, Secondi in the Western Region. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 46pp.
209 Darku, N. (2019). Effects of ginger and garlic pastes as household preservatives for fresh Clarias gariepinus (Burchell, 1822). 
B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 51pp.
210 Ansau, Y. (2017). Microbial quality on seabream from two local markets in the Kumasi Metropolis, Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. 
UDS, Tamale. 47pp.
211 Kettey-Tagoe, B. (2017). Chemical composition and sensory analysis of processed and fresh skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus 
pelamis) in Tema, Greater Accra Region. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Temale. 47pp.
207 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
5.4. HOW RESEARCH RESULTS WERE DISSEMINATED
The results of these studies were discussed at the two Conferences on Fisheries and Coastal 
Environment in 2017 and 2019. To date, there have been: (1) two conference presentations on some of 
these funded studies at the 2017 Conference; and (2) one poster session at the 2019 Conference. Given 
the critical importance of these studies, FCMCBSP is encouraging the supervising professors to co￾publish articles on these studies with their students.
5.5. EARLY EVIDENCE OF POLICY IMPACT
This series of studies has significant potential for supporting the management of highly valued demersal 
fish stocks such as the croakers in Ghana.
6.0. REVIEW OF ACTIVITY 2.1.5. 
MONITOR THE BIODIVERSITY 
AND HEALTH OF COASTAL 
ECOSYSTEMS
6.1. BACKGROUND AND ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY
The researches under this activity involved periodic examination of biodiversity of fish, benthic 
invertebrate, and mangrove communities in lagoons and estuaries to gather baseline information for 
future monitoring in view of the ongoing offshore oil and gas exploration and production. Aquatic 
environmental factors, occurrence of algal blooms, and invasive species were also investigated. The 
consultants and students undertook a series of baseline and follow-up studies different water bodies in 
Ghana. 
The study was led by three consultants: Dr. Daniel Adjei-Boateng, Dr. Regina Esi Edziyie, and Dr. Kwasi 
Obirikorang from KNUST.212 Similar studies were independently undertaken by 17 postgraduate 
students from UCC and 36 undergraduate students from UCC, UG, KNUST, UDS, and UENR.
6.2. OBJECTIVES AND METHODOLOGY OF THE BASELINE AND FOLLOW￾ON STUDIES
6.2.1. Consultants:
Baseline Study (January to April 2016): The baseline study213 by the three consultants centered on the 
assessment of the biodiversity and health of closed lagoon (Awiane Anloanu) at Half Assini in the 
212 Dr. Adjei Boateng, Senior Lecturer, DFWM, KNUST, Kumasi, Ghana; Dr. Edziyie is a Senior Lecturer at DFWM, KNUST; 
Dr. Kwasi Obirikorang is a Senior Lecturer at DFWM, KNUST.
213 DFAS. (2016c). USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Wetlands ecological health 
monitoring in the Central and Western regions of Ghana. Cape Coast: UCC.
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Western Region of Ghana. The study sought to estimate the size of the lagoon and determine its health,
taking into consideration the physical, chemical, and biological indicators. The lagoon size was estimated 
by walking its perimeter, taking Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates, and plotting these points 
on a wet season satellite image to calculate the total lagoon surface area; monthly measurement of 
temperature, salinity, pH, total dissolved solids (TDS), conductivity, and DO of the lagoon were taken 
in-situ using a pre-calibrated Hanna (HI 9828) multi-parameter probe. The water depth of the lagoon 
was measured using a graduated pole, whereas transparency was measured using a Secchi disc (20 cm 
diameter). Nutrient concentrations (in mgL-1) were determined using a photometer. The analyses of the 
water samples for phosphates and nitrates and alkalinity were carried out using photometric methods. 
Photographs of the macrophytes were taken to facilitate identification of aquatic plants fringing the 
lagoon. The granulometric analysis was performed on the sediment samples of the lagoon, whereas 
organic matter in the sediments was determined using the Loss on Ignition (LOI) method. Sediment 
samples were also collected from the lagoon and sieved on-site for macro-invertebrates. These macro￾invertebrates were transferred into 250 ml plastic low-density polyethylene (LDPE) containers and 
preserved with 70 percent ethanol for identification using a compound low-power microscope in the 
laboratory. A comprehensive fishing study was carried out using seining and hook-and-line method to 
estimate the species’ abundance in the lagoon. The study was conducted by the consultants over a four￾month period from January to April 2016 at a cost of $11, 729.33. 
6.2.2. Graduate Students:
• Rebecca Kyerewa Essamuah214 worked toward developing a decision support system (DSS) for 
prioritizing conservation of coastal zone ecological spaces in urban areas of Ghana by using Fosu 
Lagoon as a case study. This work covered a period of 14 months (November 2016 to 
December 2017). She is in the process of completing her Ph.D. dissertation to be submitted to 
DFAS; her research was supervised by Prof. Denis W. Aheto (DFAS, UCC) and Dr. Emmanuel 
Acheampong (DFAS, UCC)
• Gertrude Lucky Aku Dali215 assessed the health of the mangrove forests in Kakum and Pra 
Estuaries in Ghana from May to August 2018. She is preparing a Ph.D. dissertation to be 
submitted to DFAS for a Ph.D. degree in Integrated Coastal Zone Management. Her work was 
supervised by Prof. Denis W. Aheto (DFAS, UCC) and Prof. John Blay (DFAS, UCC).
• Alberta Jonah216 assessed the coastal ecosystems in Cape Three Points toward its designation as 
Marine Protected Area in Ghana. Her research was undertaken from August 2017 to December 
2019; and her supervisors were Prof. Denis W. Aheto (DFAS, UCC) and Dr. Isaac Okyere 
(DFAS, UCC). Her work was submitted to DFAS in January 2020. 
• Elizabeth Effah217 assessed the ecological and health implications of heavy metals and microbial 
load content of the Ankobra River on humans in Ghana. Elizabeth produced a Ph.D. dissertation 
and submitted it to DFAS in December 2019 under the supervision of Prof. Denis W. Aheto and 
Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong (DFAS, UCC). Her research covered a one-year period from 
September 2017 to August 2018.
214 Essamuah, R. K. (in prep). Towards developing a decision support system (DSS) for prioritizing conservation of coastal zone 
ecological spaces in urban areas of Ghana: a case study of the Fosu lagoon. PhD dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
215 Dali, G. L. A. (in prep). Assessment of the Health of Mangrove Forests in the Kakum and Pra Estuaries in Ghana. Ph.D. 
dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
216 Jonah, A. (2020). Assessment of coastal ecosystems in the Greater Cape Three Points area towards its designation as Marine 
Protected area in Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
217 Effah, E. (2019). Assessment of the ecological and human health implications of heavy metals and microbial load content of 
the Ankobra River, Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
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• Rahmat Quaigrane Duker218 investigated the distribution and eco-toxicological effects of PAHs 
in selected lagoons in Ghana from December 2017 to February 2019. She is still analyzing her 
data and hopes to produce a Ph.D. dissertation for submission by the end of March 2020. Her 
work is being supervised by Dr. Noble Asare (DFAS, UCC) and Prof Edward Obodai (DFAS, 
UCC). 
• Margaret Fafa Dzakpasu219 assessed the ecology of some coastal lagoons and estuaries in Ghana 
from June 2016 to August 2017 under the supervision of Prof. Kobina Yankson (UCC) and Dr. 
Emmanuel Lamptey (DMFS, UG). She produced a Ph.D. dissertation and submitted it to DFAS in 
December 2019. 
• Delove Abraham Asiedu220 studied the mesozooplankton abundance and impact of selected 
human-induced stressors on calanoid copepod in the marine coastal waters of Ghana from 
February to May 2019. His research was supervised by Dr. Noble Kwame Asare (DFAS, UCC) 
and Dr. Emmanuel Acheampong (DFAS, UCC), and he is presently writing his thesis for a M.Phil.
degree in Oceanography and Limnology. 
• Daniel Agyei221 and Elsie Akushika222 used satellite automatic identification system to monitor 
fishing activities of the artisanal tuna canoe fleet and map the potential fishing areas of the fleet 
in the coastal waters of Ghana from August 2015 to January 2016. Although they did the same 
study, they worked at different areas of the coastal waters of Ghana and produced separate 
theses and submitted them to DFAS.
• Bernard Assiam223 used Remote Sensing Application (RSA) and other social methods to assess 
aspects of ecology of the Fosu Lagoon and its associated watershed in December 2018 for a 
M.Phil. degree in Integrated Coastal Zone Management. Bernard worked under the supervision 
of Prof. Aheto W. Aheto (DFAS, UCC) and Dr. Isaac Okyere (DFAS, UCC).
224 He is yet to 
submit his thesis to DFAS. 
• Success Sowah225 assessed the water quality of three coastal water bodies (Whin Estuary, 
Narkwa Lagoon, Densu Delta) from October 2017 to July 2018 toward oyster culture in Ghana. 
Success produced a M.Phil. thesis under the supervision of Prof. Kobina Yankson (DFAS, UCC) 
and Dr. Noble (DFAS, UCC) Asare and submitted it to DFAS. 
• Gabriel Gator226 studied the morphology and microstructure of otoliths of juvenile fish species 
from the coastal waters of Ghana to provide some descriptions of the gross morphology and 
incremental patterns of the otoliths. This study was conducted over a six-month period from 
October 2018 to March 2019. He produced a M.Phil. thesis under the supervision of Prof. John 
Blay (DFAS, UCC) and Prof. Kobina Yankson (DFAS, UCC) and submitted it to DFAS. 
6.2.3. Undergraduates:
218 Rahmat, R. Q. (in prep). Distribution and eco-toxicological effects of PAHs in selected lagoons in Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. 
UCC, Cape Coast.
219 Dzakpasu, M. F. (2019). Ecological assessment of some coastal lagoons and estuaries in Ghana: abiotic and biotic approaches. 
Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
220 Asiedu, D. A. (in prep). Mesozooplankton abundance and impact of selected human-induced stressors on calanoid copepod 
in the marine coastal waters of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
221 Agyei, D. (2017). Small scale tuna fisheries monitoring using satellite automatic identification system in the coastal waters of 
Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
222 Akushika, E. (2017). Small scale tuna fisheries monitoring using satellite automatic identification system in the coastal waters 
of Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
223 Assiam, B. (in prep). Ecological studies of the Fosu Lagoon using Remote Sensing Application. Master’s Thesis. University of 
Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
224 DFAS, UCC, Cape Coast, Ghana.
225 Sowah, S. (2019). Assessment of Water Quality of Three Coastal Water Bodies Towards the Culture of Oysters in Ghana. 
Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
226 Gator, G. (2019). Morphology and microstructure of otoliths of juvenile fish species from the coastal waters of Ghana. 
Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
210 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Priscilla Dzidzor Nego examined the environmental and socio-economic threats of salt 
production to fisheries in the Songhor Lagoon, Dangme East District over a four-month period 
from January to May 2019. This work was supervised by Dr. Elliot H. Alhassan (DFARM, UDS) 
and submitted to DFARM in June 2017.
• Francis Kofi Donkor227 investigated ghost fishing of gillnets in the Black Volta near Buipe, Ghana 
from February to April 2017 under the supervision of Dr. Daniel Nsoh Akongyuure (DFARM).
Francis produced a B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it to DFARM on June, 2017. 
• Rakib Karim M. Abdul228 investigated the composition and relative abundance of fish species in 
the White Volta River at Pwalugu in Ghana before the creation of the Pwalugu multipurpose 
dam. He worked over a period of six months (November 2017 to April 2018) under the 
supervision of Dr. Elliot H. Alhassan (DFARM, UDS) to produce a B.Sc. dissertation. His work 
was submitted to DFARM in June 2018. 
• Zainab Mohammed Umar229 assessed the heavy metals in European anchovy (Engraulis 
encrosicolus) and their potential health risks on humans in Ghana. He produced a B.Sc. 
dissertation under the supervision of Dr. Samuel Addo (DMFS, UG) and submitted it to DMFS, 
UG in June 2019. 
• Kofi Oppong-Mensah230 assessed the mercury bioaccumulation in the West African oyster (C. 
tulipa) in the Pra Estuary in April 2019 under the supervision of Dr. Benjamin Osei Botwe 
(DMFS, UG). Kofi produced B.Sc. dissertation and submitted it to DMFS, UG in June 2019. 
• Fidelia Esenam Bandua231 assessed the concentration of sediment-bound heavy metals in the Pra 
Estuary in April, 2019. Her work was supervised by Dr. Benjamin Osei Botwe (DMFS, UG) and 
it was submitted to DMFS, UG in June 2019.
6.3. KEY FINDINGS AND QUALITY OF THE BASELINE STUDY AND FOLLOW￾UP STUDIES
These studies provide the baseline information that is needed in order to monitor the various 
ecosystems in the face of the ongoing and projected offshore oil and gas exploration and production in 
Ghana. 
6.3.1. Consultant Studies: The consultants’ reports revealed that:
• Awiane Lagoon has a total wetland area of 6.9 ha; 
• The water quality variables of the lagoon indicate the lagoon is mildly eutrophic characterized by 
decreased transparency and proliferation of aquatic macrophytes; and
• The lagoon supports five fish species (four cichlids and one mullet)—Hemichromis fasciatus, 
Sarotherodon melanotheron, Sarotherodon galilaeus, and Tilapia zillii; and Mugil spp. 
6.3.2. Graduate Students:
227 Donkor, F. K. (2017). Analysis of ghost fishing of gillnets in Black Volta near Buipe, Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 
45pp.
228 Abdul, R. K. M. (2018). Fish species composition and relative abundance at Pwalugu on the White Volta River before the 
Pwalugu multipurpose dam project. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 45pp.
229 Umar, Z. M. (2019). Assessment of heavy metals in Engraulis encrasicolus (Linnaeus, 1758) and their potential human health 
risks. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 57 pp.
230 Oppong-Mensah, K. (2019). Assessment of mercury bioaccumulation in the West African oyster Crassostrea tulipa inhabiting 
the Pra Estuary. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 40 pp.
231 Bandua, F. E. (2019). Assessment of the potential mobility of sediment-bound heavy metals in the Pra Estuary and its 
ecological implication. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 30 pp.
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• Essamuah (in prep)232 showed the decision support system for Ghana’s coastal zone 
management should be based on weights and ranks of productivity (fisheries), biodiversity, 
recreation and heritage site, or municipal-treated waste receptacle.
• Dali (in prep)233 found low heavy metal contamination in Kakum and Pra Esturies, but the 
mangrove forests around these estuaries were being harvested unsustainably.
• Jonah (2020)234 found ecosystems in Cape Three Points to be in good conditions for sustaining 
aquatic life, but the major anthropogenic pressures which threatened these ecosystems were 
open defecation, marine debris, waste disposal, and dynamite fishing. 
• Effah (2019)235 revealed consumption of As, Pb, N, Mn, Cd, and Cr in fish and water from the 
Ankobra River can pose carcinogenic risk to the human population since the levels are above 
the acceptable limits for consumption. 
• Dzakpasu (2019)236 revealed heavy metals are generally high in the Sakumo II and Fosu lagoons 
in Ghana, whereas species richness and diversity are generally low in these lagoons. 
• Agyei (2017)237 revealed the tuna fishery in Ghana is dominated by Katsuwonus pelamis. 
• Asiedu (in prep)238 identified four major orders of copepods in the coastal marine waters of 
Ghana: Calanoida (most abundant), Cyclopoida, Poecilostomatoida, and Harpacticoida; the 
abundance of these copepods increased with increasing phytoplankton concentrations. 
• Assiam (in prep)239 observed a reduction in the size of the Fosu Lagoon as a result of built-up 
activities.
• Sowah (2019)240 found Whin Estuary, Narkwa Lagoon, and Densu Delta to be ecologically 
healthy for culturing oysters.
• Gator (2019)241 observed different microstructural patterns of otolith among fish species in the 
coastal waters of Ghana. 
6.3.3. Undergraduates: 
• Nego (2019)242 found water siphoning by salt miners, use of chemicals, increased salinity, 
increased siltation, and short-lived fishing season as threats to the fisheries in Songhor Lagoon. 
232 Essamuah, R. K. (in prep). Towards developing a decision support system (DSS) for prioritizing conservation of coastal zone 
ecological spaces in urban areas of Ghana: a case study of the Fosu lagoon. PhD dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
233 Dali, G. L. A. (in prep). Assessment of the Health of Mangrove Forests in the Kakum and Pra Estuaries in Ghana. Ph.D. 
dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
234 Jonah, A. (2020). Assessment of coastal ecosystems in the Greater Cape Three Points area towards its designation as Marine 
Protected area in Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
235 Effah, E. (2019). Assessment of the ecological and human health implications of heavy metals and microbial load content of 
the Ankobra River, Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
236 Dzakpasu, M. F. (2019). Ecological assessment of some coastal lagoons and estuaries in Ghana: abiotic and biotic approaches. 
Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. dissertation. UCC, Cape Coast.
237 Agyei, D. (2017). Small scale tuna fisheries monitoring using satellite automatic identification system in the coastal waters of 
Ghana. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
238 Asiedu, D. A. (in prep). Mesozooplankton abundance and impact of selected human-induced stressors on calanoid copepod 
in the marine coastal waters of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
239 Assiam, B. (in prep). Ecological studies of the Fosu Lagoon using Remote Sensing Application. Master’s Thesis. University of 
Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
240 Sowah, S. (2019). Assessment of Water Quality of Three Coastal Water Bodies Towards the Culture of Oysters in Ghana. 
Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
241 Gator, G. (2019). Morphology and microstructure of otoliths of juvenile fish species from the coastal waters of Ghana. 
Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s thesis. UCC, Cape Coast.
242 Nego, P. D. (2019). Environmental and socio-economic threats of salt production to fisheries in the Songhor Lagoon, 
Dangme East District: a case study at the Songhor Lagoon, Dangme East District. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Temale 52pp.
212 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
• Donkor (2017)243 showed fish catch valued at $300 per abandoned net is lost to ghost fishing 
every three months in the Black Volta near Buipe in Ghana. 
• Abdul (2018)244 observed 22 fish species in ten families in the White Volta River at Pwalugu in 
Ghana. 
• Umar (2019)245 showed metal concentrations in the European anchovy landed in Ghana are 
within acceptable limits set by European Union (EU), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO),
and United States Environmental Protection Agency (US-EPA). 
• Oppong-Mensah (2019)246 showed that mercury levels in West African oyster in the Pra Estuary 
were below the acceptable limits set by US-EPA and World Health Organization (WHO). 
• Bandua (2019)247 revealed nickel (Ni) and lead (Pb) concentrations were high in the Pra River of 
Ghana.
6.4. HOW RESEARCH RESULTS WERE DISSEMINATED
These findings of the consultants are available online via ghanalinks.org.
248 To date, there have been: (1) 
three conference presentations on some of these funded studies at the 2017249 Conference, and six at 
the 2019 Conference;
250 and (2) four poster sessions on the data at the 2017 Conference and four
poster sessions at the 2019 Conference. Given the critical importance of these studies, FCMCBSP is 
encouraging the supervising professors to co-publish articles on these studies with their students. So far, 
two of the studies have been published on JFCom.
251
6.5. EARLY EVIDENCE OF POLICY IMPACT
The study contributes critical data to support the call by the GoG to stop using coastal water bodies as 
refuse dumping sites and to create stringent by-laws for conservation of coastal water bodies.
243 Donkor, F. K. (2017). Analysis of ghost fishing of gillnets in Black Volta near Buipe, Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 
45pp.
244 Abdul, R. K. M. (2018). Fish species composition and relative abundance at Pwalugu on the White Volta River before the 
Pwalugu multipurpose dam project. B.Sc. dissertation. UDS, Tamale. 45pp.
245 Umar, Z. M. (2019). Assessment of heavy metals in Engraulis encrasicolus (Linnaeus, 1758) and their potential human health 
risks. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 57 pp.
246 Oppong-Mensah, K. (2019). Assessment of mercury bioaccumulation in the West African oyster Crassostrea tulipa inhabiting 
the Pra Estuary. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 40 pp.
247 Bandua, F. E. (2019). Assessment of the potential mobility of sediment-bound heavy metals in the Pra Estuary and its 
ecological implication. B.Sc. dissertation. UG, Legon. 30 pp.
248 https://ghanalinks.org/web/ucc-fisheries-capacity-building-and-coastal-management/annual-quarterly-reports
249 DFAS (2017). Book of Abstracts; Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (25 – 27 September, 2017). The 
changing marine fisheries and coasts: challenges and opportunities for changing minds. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. 
79pp 
250 DFAS (2019). Book of Abstracts; 2ND Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (19 – 21 August, 2019). Fisheries 
and Coastal Governance in Contemporary. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. 75pp 
251 JFCoM is an online journal created under FCMCBSP to publish scientific papers on aquaculture, fisheries, and coastal 
environmental issues in Africa. This is a link to the journal: http://www.jfcomonline.com
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7.0. SWOT ANALYSIS OF THE 
APPROACHES ADOPTED FOR 
EXECUTING THE STUDIES UNDER 
FCMCBSP 
7.1. STRENGTHS
• Formal advertisement: The research opportunities were advertised in some popular 
newspapers such as Daily Graphic and Ghanaian Times. 
• Competitive bid process: Both consultants and postgraduate students were selected through 
formal interactions where the candidates were interviewed by a panel of DFAS faculty members. 
The successful candidates were selected to undertake the various studies.
• Rigorous processes: Terms and conditions for the various activities (2.1.1–2.1.5) in the 
workplan were set to guide the execution of the studies and the successful consultants were 
made to sign contracts after agreeing to undertake the studies. 
• Acceptable scientific methods: Conventionally acceptable methods were used to conduct 
the various studies. 
• Good supervision: The research activities of the consultants and students were supervised by 
renowned and experienced faculty members of DFAS. The dissertations and theses of the 
students were assessed by internal examiners from other departments (e.g., Department of 
Entomology and Wildlife) within UCC and external examiners from other sister universities.
7.2. WEAKNESSES
• Limited staff members: DFAS had limited human capacity to enhance supervision of the 
various activities. As a result, the staff members were overburdened with many activities at a 
time.
7.3. OPPORTUNITIES
• Funding opportunities: The research activities were fully funded under FCMCBSP. 
• Production of quality findings: More quality data and information on aquatic ecosystems and 
their health conditions, fisheries, fisheries governance, and fish value chain in Ghana have been 
produced. 
• High rate of Graduation: Previously, only a few students at UCC graduated with Ph.D. and 
M.Phil. degrees in the areas of Aquaculture, Limnology and Oceanography, Fisheries Science, and 
Integrated Coastal Zone Management. But now more students are going to graduate with higher 
degrees in the said areas of study under FCMCBSP. 
7.4. THREATS
• Teaching responsibilities: The lead staff members who oversaw the execution of the various 
activities had teaching responsibilities to handle at UCC. This might have compromised the 
supervisory roles of the lead persons.
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8.0. SWOT ANALYSIS PERFORMED 
ON ACTIVITY 2.1.6: DEVELOPING 
MARINE AND COASTAL FISHERIES 
DATABASE
8.1. STRENGTHS
• Rigorous processes: Rigorous processes were followed to create the database 
(FishCoMGhana; http://www.fishcomghana.com), including organizing a workshop to discuss how 
the database could be created, selecting a computer programmer through advertisement, 
developing a work plan for the creation processes approved by DFAS project team 
management, domain registration with GoDaddy Inc., and hosting acquisition and server set up 
with a secure DNS and SSL certificate.
• Formal advertisement: The programmer of the database (FishCoMGhana) was selected after 
a public advertisement. The selection was based on the programmer’s profound experience and 
expertise in Information Technology and database creation.
• Rigorous consultation and collaboration: The database was created and launched at a 
workshop organized at UG in Accra where all the collaborating partners252 were present to sign 
Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to agree on constant sharing of information for stocking 
the database. The MOU was approved by the UCC legal counsel.
• Strong imitation: The database was modeled after world data centers such as OBIS and 
PANGAEA, which are known to be robust, effective, and user friendly.
• Quality and reliable: The data and information on FishCoMGhana are quality and reliable for 
referencing, teaching and learning, and decision-making on fisheries and coastal management 
because every article is peer reviewed by experts prior to publication in the database.
• Regular updates: Well-educated researchers have been employed to update the database 
periodically with quality information on fisheries.
• User-friendly: Information can easily be accessed online by users from all the major browsers. 
A workshop was even organized for most potential users to learn how to easily and intuitively 
use the database. The database responds to queries through a search engine.
• Time efficient: Online platform provide a ready access to information.
• Cost reduction: Researchers can easily rely on the internet service of their institutions to 
access the information in the database at low cost.
• Worldwide accessibility: The database is meant to be accessed by a wide range of 
authenticated users, including researchers, students, and managers of aquatic environment and 
resources in Ghana and beyond. At the moment, online tracking indicates a lot of people from 
different countries (including US, Brazil, etc.) have visited the database. 
• Funded in advance: The database has been funded to cover a period of five years into the 
future (2019–2024). 
252 Environmental Protection Agency, Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture Development, Fisheries Commission, UENR, UG, 
KNUST, UDS, CSIR, URI, USAID, and Civil Society Representatives.
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• Proper management: A team of learned people including some staff member of DFAS has 
been formed to manage the day-to-day activities of the database. This team has been equipped 
with the needed skills to efficiently manage its key aspects. 
• Regular workshop: Regular workshops are planned to assess the progress on the database’s
usage and sustenance. So far, one workshop has been organized to assess any progress made on 
the database after its creation and launch.
8.2. WEAKNESSES
• Security problems: The security of the database can be compromised by hackers because it is 
an online service.
• Weak internet service: Intermittent on-and-off internet service engendered by system failure 
in some institutions in Ghana might make the use of the database undesirable.
• Limited to issues in Ghana: The data and information on FishCoMGhana capture 
information on fisheries and coastal management in Ghana only.
• Functionality limited to internet accessibility: The data and information in the database 
cannot be accessed without internet service.
• Data sharing is a challenge: Unwillingness of certain partners to contribute data and 
information might compromise the sustenance of the database.
• Accessibility is contribution dependent: Institutions will have varying degrees of accessing 
the database depending on the extent of their data contributions. 
• High cost of creating and maintaining the platform: An amount of $16,144.44 was spent 
to create the database and huge amount of money will be required to maintain it. As it stands, 
the maintenance of the database has been funded in advance at a cost of $14,038.32 to cover a 
period of five years (2019–2024). 
8.3. OPPORTUNITIES
• Boost education: The database is a repository of information where users are provided with 
reference materials to support and boost teaching and learning as far as education on fisheries 
and coastal issues in Ghana are concerned. 
• Strengthen decision-making: Volumes of fisheries data and information populated in the 
database will encourage and facilitate decision and policy-making on fisheries and coastal 
management in Ghana.
• Research efficiency: The database will boost fisheries research activities by providing 
references on documented fisheries issues in Ghana.
• Funding opportunities: Through proposal writing, donor agencies are likely to provide 
funding to sustain the database if they have interest in disseminating information on fisheries 
issues 
• Business avenue: The database is likely to be run through subscription modality to generate 
funds for sustaining the service when the five-year funding is exhausted.
• Institutional networking: Institutional networking among universities, practitioners, and 
policy makers will be promoted.
• Security and quality assurance of scientific data: The database will promote the security 
and quality assurance of scientific data on fisheries governance issues in Ghana.
8.4. THREATS
• Limited financing: Limited finances to sustain the database might lead to its intermittent 
shutdown. It is therefore advisable to propose to the right funding agencies to source funds for 
sustaining the database. 
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• Subscription: The database will be operated through subscription approach to ensure 
sustenance, especially when the funded period elapses. It is therefore recommended measures 
should be put in place to give discounts to users who frequently contribute data and/or 
information to the database.
• Limited usage due to high cost: Users, especially students, are likely to get discouraged 
from using the database once the subscription system is instituted. To encourage database usage 
by students, provisions should be made to liaise with education institutions to cover the 
students in their subscriptions.
• Vulnerability to hackers: Hackers might take advantage of the database to invade the privacy 
of users online.
• Lack of cooperation to share data: Lack of cooperation among partners to share data for 
updating the platform might hinder the regular update of the database.
• Unfavorable data use policies: Unfavorable policies implemented to run the database, 
especially when the subscription system is introduced, might discourage users from using the 
platform. 
9.0. CONCLUSIONS
In all, four teams of consultants were contracted to execute Activities 2.1.1 – 2.1.6 successfully and 
satisfactorily, and 36 postgraduate students and 152 undergraduate students were selected to contribute 
toward execution of these activities. About 61 percent of the graduate students and 30 percent of the 
undergraduate students were females. So far, 29 graduate students and all 152 undergraduate students 
have completed their studies and submitted to their departments. In most cases, the objectives set by 
the researchers for the studies were relevant to address the research problems, and the research 
methods were conventionally acceptable and scientifically sound to achieve those objectives. As a result, 
the researchers have been able to produce quality findings to guide policy making toward conservation 
and management of aquatic resources in Ghana and to promote the aquaculture industry in the country. 
The database, FishCoMGhana, is also set to serve as a repository for data and information on issues 
related to fisheries, coastal zone management, and aquaculture.
10.0. BIBLIOGRAPHY OF 
DOCUMENTS PRODUCED UNDER 
ACTIVITY 2.1.1-2.1.6
Activity 2.1.1. Conducting Fisheries Stock Assessment
DFAS. (2016a). The USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. 
Mid-term Report on Fisheries Stock Assessment of Some Selected Commercially Important Marine 
Fish Stocks in Ghana. Cape Coast: University of Cape Coast.
DFAS. (2017a). The USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. 
Final Performance Report on Fisheries Stock Assessment of Some Selected Commercially Important 
Marine Fish Stocks in Ghana. Cape Coast: University of Cape Coast.
217 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
DFAS (2017d). Book of Abstracts; Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (25 – 27 
September, 2017). The changing marine fisheries and coasts: challenges and opportunities for 
changing minds. UCC, Cape Coast. 79pp 
DFAS (2019b). Book of Abstracts; 2ND Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment (19 –
21August, 2019). Fisheries and Coastal Governance in Contemporary. UCC, Cape Coast. 75pp 
Kassah, J. E. (2019). Aspects of the biology and length-based assessment of the Atlantic chub mackerel 
Scomber colias (Scombridae) stock off the coast of Ghana. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Cape 
Coast, Cape Coast
Clottey, M. (2019). Population dynamics and reproductive studies of three commercially important 
sparid species from Ghanaian waters. PhD dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. 
Ameworwor, M. Y. (in prep). Observations on the bottom-set gillnet fishery and the biology of selected 
species at three locations off the Central Region coast of Ghana. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of 
Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Amador, E. (in prep). Stock assessment and some aspects of reproduction of two fish species in 
Ghanaian waters. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Ofosu, E. S. (2018). The Catch per unit effort (CPUE) and length-weight relationship of Nile tilapia 
(Oreochromis niloticus) in the Kakum Lake, Brimsu. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast.
Frempong, N. M. (2019). Growth and mortality parameters of Sardinella maderensis (Lowe, 1838) landed 
by beach seines at Sakumono beach and their implications for management. B.Sc. Dissertation. 
University of Ghana, Legon. 57 pp.
Wonje, M. W. (2019). Gear diversity and selectivity in the artisanal fishery at the Tema Fishing Harbor. 
B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Ghana, Legon. 35 pp.
Activity 2.1.2. Conducting Research and Assessment on Marine Fisheries Governance 
Issues
DFAS. (2016b). The USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project: 
Study Report on Research and Assessment on Marine Fisheries Governance Issues. Cape Coast: 
University of Cape Coast.
DFAS. (2019a). The USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project.
Sustained Research in Governance Issues on Marine and Coastal Management in Ghana. Cape 
Coast: University of Cape Coast.
Annan, J. (2019). Assessment of Traditional Governance Systems in Support of Artisanal Fisheries 
Management in the Western Region of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast.
Adonu, P. (2018). The role of women in fish processing in James Town, Greater Accra Region. B.Sc. 
Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Temale. 60pp.
Activity 2.1.3. Research on Fish and Shellfish of Commercial Value
218 | FCMCBSP FINAL PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT USAID.GOV
Okyere, I. & Boahemaa-Kobil, E. E. (2020). Occurrence and food habits of the bagrid catfish Chrysichthys 
nigrodigitatus (Lacepède, 1803) in the Pra River Estuary, Ghana. Journal of Fisheries and Coastal 
Management,1(1): 29-34.
Asare, B., Obodai, E. A., Acheampong, E. (2019). Mangrove oyster farming: Prospects as supplementary 
livelihood for a Ghanaian fishing community. Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management, 1(1): 8-17.
Tseku, P. D. (2016). Performance of the black chinned tilapia, Sarotherodon melanotheron fed different 
formulated feeds in a reservoir. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Johnson-Ashun, M. (2018). Effects of ginger and garlic supplements on culture performance of blackchin 
tilapia (Sarotherodon melanotheron). Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. 168 pp.
Baidoo, K. (2018). Utilization of two brackish water systems near Cape Coast (Ghana) as nurseries for 
Juvenile marine fishes. Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. 117 pp.
Dogah, W. (2019). Studies on aspects of the biology of Clarias gariepinus and Heterobranchus longifilis from 
river Offin; towards their culture development in Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, 
Cape Coast. 117 pp.
Odoom F. B. (2019). Assessment of some aspects of the biology and ecology of blackchin tilapia in 
Benya, Brenu and Fosu lagoons. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Asare, B. (2016). Aquaculture potential of the West African mangrove oyster (Crassostrea tulipa): a case 
study of the species in the Nakwa Lagoon of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, 
Cape Coast.
Nikoi-Olai, G. (2019). Some aspects of the reproductive biology of the West African mangrove oyster 
(Crassostrea tulipa) in Amisa and Benya lagoons of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, 
Cape Coast.
Chuku, E. (2019). Strategies for optimizing spat collection and growth of the oyster for its mass 
production in the coastal water bodies of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast.
Osei, I. K. (2019). Some aspects of the biology and culture potential of the West African mangrove 
oyster, Crassostrea tulipa in the Densu Delta, Ghana. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, 
Cape Coast.
Onwonah-Owiredu, D. (2019). Investigating Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) mortalities in cages on the 
Lake Volta in Ghana. B.Sc. Dissertation. Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, 
Kumasi. 67pp. 
Gyapon, A. T. (2019). The effect of Volta clam (Galatea paradoxa) on water quality and fish growth in 
earthen ponds. B.Sc. Dissertation. Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi. 
74 pp. 
Appiah-Kubi, R. (2019). Response of two tilapia strains to high temperature and low dissolved oxygen 
stress. BSc Dissertation. Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi. 47 pp. 
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Sarfo, F. (2019). Replacement of fish oil with palm kernel oil on growth, feed utilization, proximate 
composition and economic analysis of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus). B.Sc. Dissertation. 
University of Development Studies, Tamale. 60 pp. 
Mensah, G. D. (2019). Substitution of fish meal with shea nut meal in diets of Nile tilapia fry on growth, 
feed utilization and economic analysis. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, 
Temale. 54pp.
Anane, K. (2019). Evaluation of induced breeding of catfish (Clarias gariepinus), using different doses of 
normal saline diluted ovaprim. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Temale. 33pp.
Kamonjado, P. B. (2018). Growth performance of duckweed feed fed and commercial feed fed 
Oreochromis niloticus fingerlings reared in an earthen pond. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy 
and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 53 pp. 
Awuni, I. (2018). Effects of feed pellets size on the growth performance of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis 
niloticus) fingerlings reared in tanks. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, 
Sunyani. 44 pp.
Kuma, G. K. (2017). Observations on the growth and reproduction of tank-reared black chinned tilapia, 
Sarotherodon melanotheron in different salinities. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural 
Resources, Sunyani. 34 pp.
Nyan, C.A. (2019). Performance testing of two strains (gift and Akosombo) of Oreochromis niloticus. B.Sc. 
Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 34 pp.
Sarfoah, L. (2019). Growth response of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) fry fed diets with variable 
crude protein levels. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 34 pp.
Acolatse, E. S. (2017). Preliminary study on the culture potential of Tilapia guineensis in earthen ponds: a 
comparative growth study with Nile tilapia. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural 
Resources, Sunyani. 53 pp.
Bissih, F. (2018). Effect of Farm made and a commercial feed on length-weight relationship and condition 
factor of Nile tilapia in ponds. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, 
Sunyani. 59 pp.
Tia, I. H. (2019). Growth of giant duckweed, Spirodela polyrhiza on different concentration of organic 
manure. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 27 p
Activity 2.1.4. Analysis of Value Chains of Fish Trade
Gyampoh, B. A., Atitsogbui, G., Obirikorang, K. A. (2020). Understanding the neglected shellfish fishery 
of the Keta Lagoon, Ghana. Journal of Fisheries and Coastal Management, 2(1): 1-11.
Ntim, L. (in prep). Value chain analysis of the croakers (Pseudotolithus senegalensis and Pseudotolithus 
typus) in the Ghanaian Fishery. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast
Darku, N. (2019). Effects of ginger and garlic pastes as household preservatives for fresh Clarias 
gariepinus (Burchell, 1822). B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Tamale. 51pp.
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Danquah, I. (2019). Marketing challenges among traders of tilapia in Kumasi metropolis in the Ashanti 
Region of Ghana. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Tamale. 61pp.
Ansau, Y. (2017). Microbial quality on seabream from two local markets in the Kumasi Metropolis, 
Ghana. B.Sc. dissertation. University of Development Studies, Tamale. 47pp.
Yakutu, S. (2019). Microbial load analysis in some selected smoked fish species in Yapei Market in the 
Northern Region, Ghana. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Tamale. 56pp.
Kettey-Tagoe, B. (2017). Chemical composition and sensory analysis of processed and fresh skipjack 
tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) in Tema, Greater Accra Region. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of 
Development Studies, Tamale. 47pp.
Assan, D. (2018). Post-harvest fish loss at the landing site and during transportation at Tema Fishing 
Harbour. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Tamale. 34pp.
Mumin, S. A. (2018). Assessment of post-harvest fish losses during marketing: a case study at the 
Ashaiman Market. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Tamale. 43pp. 
Osman, A. W. (2018). Factors responsible for fish spoilage at the market and processing centers of 
Albert Bosomtwi-Sam Fishing Harbour, Secondi in the Western Region. B.Sc. Dissertation. 
University of Development Studies, Tamale. 46pp. 
Afriyie, G. (2017). Assessment of trade and marketing of aquaculture products in the Sunyani 
Municipality. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 77 pp.
Anokyewaa, M. A. (2018). Economic analysis of small-scale aquaculture enterprise in Sunyani 
Municipality. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 53 pp.
Sakyi, K. (2019). Assessment of histamine levels in frozen fish in dome market in Ghana and its 
implications on consumers. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. 
42 pp.
Agyare, S. A. (2019). Adoption of hotor oven by fish processors in the Central Region of Ghana. B.Sc. 
Dissertation. Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi. 72 pp.
Atitsogbui, G. (2019). Value chain analysis of shellfishes of commercial importance on the Keta Lagoon. 
B.Sc. Dissertation. Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi. 65 pp.
Activity 2.1.5. Monitor the Biodiversity and Health of Coastal Ecosystems
DFAS. (2016c). Wetlands ecological health monitoring in the Central and Western regions of Ghana. Cape 
Coast: University of Cape Coast for the USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity 
Building Support Project.
DFAS. (2016d). USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Annual 
Report, October 1, 2015 - September 30, 2016. Cape Coast: University of Cape Coast.
DFAS. (2017b). An Assessment of the Biodiversity and Health of Coastal Ecosystems with Special Focus on a 
Closed Lagoon at Half Assini (Awiane Anloanu) in the Western Region of Ghana. Cape Coast: University 
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of Cape Coast for the USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support 
Project:
DFAS. (2017c). USAID/UCC Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project. Annual 
Report, October 1, 2016 - September 30, 2017. University of Cape Coast. Cape Coast: University of 
Cape Coast. 
Essamuah, R. K. (in prep). Towards developing a decision support system (DSS) for prioritizing 
conservation of coastal zone ecological spaces in urban areas of Ghana: a case study of the Fosu 
lagoon. PhD Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of 
Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Dali, G. L. A. (in prep). Assessment of the Health of Mangrove Forests in the Kakum and Pra Estuaries in 
Ghana. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of 
Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Jonah, A. (2020). Assessment of coastal ecosystems in the Greater Cape Three Points area towards its 
designation as Marine Protected area in Ghana. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast.
Effah, E. (2019). Assessment of the ecological and human health implications of heavy metals and 
microbial load content of the Ankobra River, Ghana. Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cape Coast, 
Cape Coast.
Rahmat, R. Q. (in prep). Distribution and eco-toxicological effects of PAHs in selected lagoons in Ghana. 
Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Dzakpasu, M. F. (2019). Ecological assessment of some coastal lagoons and estuaries in Ghana: abiotic 
and biotic approaches. Ph.D. dissertation. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Ph.D. Dissertation. 
University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Asiedu, D. A. (in prep). Mesozooplankton abundance and impact of selected human-induced stressors
on calanoid copepod in the marine coastal waters of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape 
Coast, Cape Coast.
Agyei, D. (2017). Small scale tuna fisheries monitoring using satellite automatic identification system in 
the coastal waters of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Akushika, E. (2017). Small scale tuna fisheries monitoring using satellite automatic identification system in 
the coastal waters of Ghana. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Assiam, B. (in prep). Ecological studies of the Fosu Lagoon using Remote Sensing Application. Master’s 
Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape 
Coast.
Sowah, S. (2019). Assessment of Water Quality of Three Coastal Water Bodies Towards the Culture of 
Oysters in Ghana. Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. 
University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
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Gator, G. (2019). Morphology and microstructure of otoliths of juvenile fish species from the coastal 
waters of Ghana. Master’s thesis. University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast. Master’s Thesis. University 
of Cape Coast, Cape Coast.
Donkor, F. K. (2017). Analysis of ghost fishing of gillnets in Black Volta near Buipe, Ghana. B.Sc. 
Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Temale. 45pp.
Abdul, R. K. M. (2018). Fish species composition and relative abundance at Pwalugu on the White Volta 
River before the Pwalugu multi-purpose dam project. B.Sc. dissertation. University of Development 
Studies, Temale. 45pp.
Umar, Z. M. (2019). Assessment of heavy metals in Engraulis encrasicolus (Linnaeus, 1758) and their 
potential human health risks. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Ghana, Legon. 57 pp.
Oppong-Mensah, K. (2019). Assessment of mercury bioaccumulation in the West African oyster 
Crassostrea tulipa inhabiting the Pra Estuary. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Ghana, Legon. 40 pp.
Bandua, F. E. (2019). Assessment of the potential mobility of sediment-bound heavy metals in the Pra 
Estuary and its ecological implication. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Ghana, Legon. 30 pp.
Nego, P. D. (2019). Environmental and socio-economic threats of salt production to fisheries in the 
Songhor Lagoon, Dangme East District: a case study at the Songhor Lagoon, Dangme East District. 
B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Development Studies, Temale 52pp.
Otoo, E. A. N. (2018). Water quality assessment in aquaculture ponds of variable environmental and 
production characteristics. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, 
Sunyani.48 pp.
Twumasi, S. (2017). Fish community diversity and its relationship with habitat and environmental
variables in the Sunyani stream. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural Resources, 
Sunyani.44 pp.
Boadum, P. K. (2017). Fish community variation along physical and environmental gradients in Aso 
Kwaku stream in Sunyani Municipality. B.Sc. Dissertation. University of Energy and Natural 
Resources, Sunyani.37 pp. 
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ANNEX VII. THE HISTORICAL 
EVOLUTION OF THE CENTRE FOR 
COASTAL MANAGEMENT AT THE 
UNIVERSITY OF CAPE COAST
FY 1997: University of Cape Coast (UCC) was identified as a focal institution to lead the Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) 
programme in Ghana as far back as 1997 when the Village Infrastructure Project (VIP) was being implemented by Ministry of 
Fisheries and Aquaculture Development (MoFAD) under the auspices of the World Bank. As part of that project, an ICM team 
was constituted in 1998 to introduce coastal management into UCC’s curriculum to train students to work for governmental and 
non-governmental organizations dealing with coastal management issues. The then-Department of Zoology was to take oversight 
responsibility of this project. 
FY 2001: With the ending of the VIP about 2001, the ICM programme also stalled. 
FY 2002/2003: The onset of the School of Biological Sciences enabled the ICM project to be revived. An ICM library was 
established within the Department of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (DFAS), and modules were developed for inclusion in the 
undergraduate and postgraduate DFAS programmes. To date, various courses are presently on stream at the undergraduate and 
graduate levels. Although the idea for a Centre for Coastal Management (CCM) was envisioned as far back as 1997, takeoff 
delayed largely due of lack of funding. 
FY 2009: Dr. Denis Aheto was recruited as a lecturer at DFAS to support Prof. John Blay in the teaching and the further 
development of the Coastal Management programme within UCC. In the same year, the USAID-supported Integrated Fisheries 
and Coastal Governance (ICFG) Project implemented by the Coastal Resources Center-Ghana, an affiliate of the Coastal 
Resources Center of University of Rhode Island (CRC/URI) was launched in Ghana.
FY 2010: DFAS signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Coastal Resources Center-Ghana to collaborate in 
executing the USAID-funded ICFG Initiative, popularly called the “Hεn Mpoano” Project. Through this project, the proposed 
CCM of UCC found a promising window of opportunity to roll out coastal management programs in the country. 
As a first step, the ICFG initiative, through one of its local affiliate non-governmental organizations (NGOs), Friends of the 
Nation, awarded an urban wetland assessment study of the Western Region to Dr. Denis Aheto on consultancy basis. Following 
that he was nominated by ICFG to undertake a three-week certificate short course on climate change adaptation at CRC/URI. 
Based on that training, the course was later replicated for district planners in the six coastal districts of the Western Region by 
the faculty of DFAS and funded by ICFG. The success of that initiative further encouraged ICFG to later sub-obligate additional 
consultancies to the department, notable among them the development of the wetlands curricula for junior high school students, 
training of the ICFG staff in coastal management, and the involvement of some DFAS staff in a biodiversity study of the Western 
Region of Ghana. 
FY 2012: With financial assistance from ICFG, Prof. John Blay and Dr. Denis Aheto (then the Chair of the Department) with 
support of Ms. Pam Rubinoff of CRC/URI, drafted the first strategic plan (2012-2017) and developed a proposal for the 
formalization of CCM within UCC, which was later in the same year submitted to UCC for approval. 
FY 2013: On the December 13, 2013, CCM was approved by the UCC Academic Board to be under the School of Biological 
Sciences, but placed in a special relationship with DFAS. The latter being as a result of lack of staff, office space, and other logistics 
needed to effectively run the new Centre. 
Prof. John Blay was appointed as the Coordinator of the Center. The mandate of the Centre was three-fold: 1) conduct applied 
research; 2) run professional courses; and 3) engage in extension in coastal communities. Because of its contribution to ICFG, 
DFAS was encouraged to submit a proposal to USAID for an unsolicited Government-to-Government (G2G) grant to build the 
capacity of DFAS and fully operationalize the Centre. 
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FY 2014: The G2G grant for the Fisheries and Coastal Management Capacity Building Support Project (FCMCBSP) was signed on 
October 20, 2014 after the Centre’s status within the university was clarified. The FCMCBSP Board was created in 2015 under 
the Chairmanship of Professor Isaac Galyuon, Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. At the same time a separate 
CCM Board was created under the Chairmanship of the founding dean of the UCC law faculty, Prof. Bondzie-Simpson. 
FY 2015: In January 2015, CCM started executing its first-year plan using existing faculty from DFAS. Within a few months, it 
became apparent that the workload was too much for the faculty to execute on top of their existing research and teaching duties 
since the grant document did not allow the project to buy back staff time from the university. Thus all activities were executed on 
top of the faculty’s existing work load.
In the same month of January 2015, the then-head of DFAS Dr. Aheto, the Vice-Chancellor Prof. D. D. Kuupole, Centre 
Coordinator Prof. John Blay, and M&E Coordinator Dr. Noble Asare Asare made a two-week exchange visit to URI. During this 
visit, a number of new ideas and partnership arrangements were suggested, including: the J-term program, the dual-degree Ph.D. 
program, and the joint training of ten Ph.D. students from DFAS at URI. 
FY 2016: It became very apparent that the workload at DFAS and CCM was enormous to the extent that it would not be 
possible to allow it deliver on its agreement with USAID in the implementation of the FCMCBSP. To address this issue, DFAS: 1) 
started using consultants to execute many of the key activities identified in the workplan; and 2) requested USAID to authorize 
the use of G2G funds to hire six full-time research assistants to assist with activity execution. In addition to this, the CCM asked 
SFMP to fund the stipend of two graduate students to work on the project as extension agents for CCM only.
USAID paid the Africa Lead project to conduct a capacity assessment of the CCM using the Organizational Capacity Assessment 
Tool used on other organizations to serve as a baseline for future monitoring and evaluation.
The Vice Chancellor recommended the position of Centre Coordinator, which had been occupied first by Prof. John Blay then by 
Dr. Aheto, be upgraded to a position of Director of the Centre based on the early execution of the FCMCBSP activities, which 
were already showing results. This upgrade was important because it gave the director leverage to negotiate within the university 
system where a centre coordinator could not.
FY 2017: Recruited two full-time permanent research fellows paid for by UCC;
In January 2017, the project capitalized on this increased capacity to apply for its second major grant from DANIDA, which was 
executed using the same staff since the new grant did not include a provision recruitment of additional staff.
In anticipation of future grant activity and the growing number of core platforms of the CCM (FishCoMGhana; conferences; 
short-courses; communication strategy; extension; project management), the CCM submitted a request to the central 
administration to consider its request for appointment of six research assistants to full-time assistant research fellow 
positions. This process is still under review by the university and expected to be approved by May, 2020, even though it cannot 
be determined. 
FY 2018: CCM applied for the World Bank Africa Center of Excellence (ACE) grant, which it received in January 2019. This 
grant, like the DANIDA grant, is being executed with the same core group. In addition to this, CCM has acquired three smaller 
projects from the National Geographic Society, the French Embassy, and the Third World Academy of Science, each with no 
additional funding for staff. 
In recognition of the international importance of the World Bank ACE Program, UCC appointed an International Scientific 
Advisory Board chaired by Professor Martin Tsamenyi, Emeritus Professor and Former Director of the Australian National 
Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCoRS) as Chairman to provide needed leadership for regional impact. 
FY 2020: Increasing student numbers, retirement of three full DFAS professors, the closure of the FCMCBSP (resulting in the 
loss of additional core staff and research assistants for CCM), and other cross-cutting issues that detracted DFAS and CCM 
leadership from organizational and capacity-strengthening activities forced them to look into other ways of recruiting new staff.
In its quest to address this challenge, CCM is exploring new ways of teaching and research by improving its teaching and learning 
environment under the Africa Center of Excellence in Coastal Resilience (ACECoR) grant, and introduce modular and online and 
virtual teaching programs and is developing two new partnerships in Europe mainly Germany (Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine
Research [ZMT]) and France (Research Institute for Development [IRD]).
Source: CCM Director Denis Aheto, February, 8, 2020.
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ANNEX VIII. DISCLOSURE OF ANY 
CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
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