Paris, 20 October 2020 – The European and North Atlantic Office (EUR/NAT) held a EUR/NAT DGCA virtual meeting on Sustainable Funding of States Civil Aviation Authorities (CAAs) on 20 October 2020. The Meeting discussed and approved the conclusions and actions that came from the workshop held on 29 September on the same topic. They include specific initiatives to be developed and delivered by the EUR/NAT Office in the coming months to support the 56 States to which the Office is accredited.
With the participation of Mr. Luis Ribeiro, Director General of CAA Portugal and Chairman of the ICAO EUR/NAT DGCA meeting, Dr. Fang Liu, ICAO Secretary General, and Ms. Silvia Gehrer, Regional Director ICAO EUR/NAT, the meeting set the scene on the relevance and urgency to address the issue of CAA funding. "Our concerns are not new," said Mr. Ribeiro, "we recently discussed the topic during the EUR/NAT Workshop on Sustainable Funding where States described the main challenges faced in the area of sustainable availability of financial resources and qualified personnel to enable the effective functioning of State safety, security and economic oversight. The cases and experiences shared by some of our Civil Aviation Authorities provided us with invaluable insights and inspiration".
ICAO Secretary General Dr. Fang Liu reiterated the UN agency's call for national governments to assure the sustainable funding of their CAAs. "ICAO has been advocating tirelessly on the topics of economic impact and alleviation measures during the COVID-19 crisis, and we will undertake everything we can to help you during these dire and unprecedented circumstances." highlighted Dr. Liu in her opening remarks.
"The virtual workshop we held recently on 29 September was open to all States, European, and International Aviation Organizations and the aviation industry in the EUR/NAT Region. The workshop definitely fostered interesting and open discussions." said Ms. Gehrer.
During the second session, the participants received a brief update on the latest status of States' implementation of the CART Recommendations from the CRRIC, and in particular, shared some relevant experiences on Recommendation #10, on appropriate funding for CAAs. Dr. Jordaan, ICAO Chief of Aviation Medicine, also provided a brief update on the ongoing ICAO work on Testing and Quarantine.
A total of eighty-three (83) participants from thirty-four (34) States and five (5) international organisations (EASA, EUROCONTROL, ECAC, IAC and ACAO), attended this DGCA virtual meeting.
"Following the discussions today and the recommendations endorsed by the DGCA meeting, the EUR/NAT Office is gladly looking forward to implementing the series of initiatives and activities to continue creating awareness on this topic, but most importantly, to develop and deliver the tools identified and to help States in this urgent mandate", said Ms. Gehrer in her closing remarks.
In follow-up, the next ICAO EUR/NAT DGCA meeting is planned to take place on 7 December 2020, focussing on the topic briefly introduced today, about Testing and Quarantine, CRRIC Updates and Performance Charts and additional States experiences on Implementation, including Recommendation #10.
The DGCA virtual meeting presentations are available at:
EURNAT-DGCA 2020-7 Teleconference Sustainable Funding of CAAs
Shorter version of the web - link
https://bit.ly/3m4WkeT
