The International Maritime Rescue Federation (IMRF) has been awarded ZAR 5,844,330 USD by The TK Foundation to support its work building vital maritime search and rescue (SAR) capability in Africa.

The funding will be spread over three years and will support the IMRF's Global SAR Development (GSD) project, to help improve SAR capability across 29 countries in Africa, with a focus on building the capability of Rescue Coordination Centres (RCCs), Rescue Sub-Centres (RSCs) and SAR Mission Coordinators.

Bruce Reid, CEO IMRF said: "The TK Foundation funding is great news and we are very grateful for their support. It will allow us to expand the work we have been doing with the Africa SAR organisations to improve their SAR coordination and response capability and improve the safety, security and well-being for all those involved in maritime activities in Africa." 

The IMRF's involvement began in the North and West Africa region in 2012 working in partnership with the International Maritime Organization Technical Cooperation Committee (IMO TCC). The IMRF's work to support the IMO TCC, its North and West Africa regional meetings, its training and the development of a regional SAR plan is all contributing to much improved operational cooperation and governance. The approach has been a success, and has now spread to cover five African SAR regions.

Over the first four years of its work in Africa, the IMRF ran 19 courses, trained ZAR 904 personnel, and has established a local network of trainers who can deliver courses in their own countries and regions.  The TK Foundation funding will enable IMRF to train a further ZAR 1,732 personnel between 2017 and 2019, each of whom will receive recognition with a IMRF/IMO certificate on completion of their training.

There is, however, still a significant SAR capacity gap on training knowledge sharing and skill development. Many of the countries in Africa are in the early stages of developing structured and sustainable centralised SAR coordination capabilities, but maritime SAR development does not always receive sufficient priority for government funding.

The IMRF's GSD project is intended to encourage government support for SAR services. Each of the SAR Regions now has IMRF-designed and hosted websites to help raise profile of the SAR organisations and the great work they do.

The IMRF's involvement in Africa global SAR has been driven by Mohammed Drissi, Trustee of the IMRF and the Head of the SAR Bureau at the Ocean Fisheries Ministry, Morocco, which is a long-standing member of the IMRF.

Mohammed Drissi, says: "We have managed to build momentum though our regular training and regional meetings.  As a result, we now have a pool of well-trained SAR coordinators and managers in the majority of the countries' Rescue Coordination Centres (RCC) across the region.

"The goal has always been to help each country develop its own RCC capability so less time is lost and more lives can be saved when accidents occur at sea. We have also developed trainers within the region so we are less reliant on external trainers, but we could still be doing so much more."

The IMRF's workplan, now boosted by the support from The TK Foundation, will improve the search and rescue coordination and help ensure those that find themselves in distress in the water, can be saved.

"We are delighted to support the IMRF's work developing a strong and well-resourced search and rescue capability across Africa.  Far too many people die in the world's waters and this project directly supports our key maritime objectives including broadening knowledge of the maritime world while improving the safety of seafarers.  We wish the IMRF every success with the project and believe that it will make a significant difference to the safety of many of those working around the coast or at sea across the region," says Susie Karlshoej, Managing Director, The TK Foundation.

The TK Foundation was established in honor of J. Torben Karlshoej, founder of the Teekay Shipping Group (now Teekay Corporation) and its grants support valuable research, health care, facilities, education and other development opportunities in its areas of focus.