Air Commodore Kwame Mamphey (Rtd), Director General of the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA), has called for increased regional cooperation in order to develop African solutions that will counter the heat generated by the European Union's Emission Trading Scheme tax.

At the beginning of a three-day Inter FIR Coordinating Meeting which started yesterday in Accra, Air Cmdre Mamphey said the repercussions of the EU scheme tax for the African aviation industry was unbearable.

The meeting is being attended by six African states and international organisations including the Agency for Aerial Navigation Safety in Africa and Madagascar (ASECNA) and International Air Transport Association (IATA).

'No single African institution or state acting individually can surmount that, but together, we can have a say and influence the direction of global policy initiatives.'

According to him, it was pertinent that Africa took advantage of the skills and expertise that other member states had.

'How do we ensure that standards are uniform across our various states to achieve the global seamless air traffic management?'

On efforts so far been made by GCAA towards the implementation of the new ICAO flight plan by the deadline of November 15, this year, the Director General noted that his outfit was in the process of installing aeronautical message handling system.

Also, he said since the development of human capital was important for the industry, GCAA was expanding the capacity of the Ghana Aviation Training Academy (GATA) to provide the training needs of personnel.

Additionally, he said GCAA has installed automatic dependent system contract/controller pilot data link communication to take care of surveillance and communications over the oceanic airspace.

Collaboration in the African Indian Ocean (AFI) region led to the development and implementation of 65 new user-preferred routes in less than two years in pursuance of International Civil Aviation Authority strategic objective of dynamic and flexible air traffic management.

 By Samuel Boadi