Incorporating the SSF Guidelines into the national fisheries policy requires several rounds of engagement with state and community stakeholders. The onset of the new millennium saw the process of fisheries development taking a new path globally. It’s one with a strong emphasis on offshore and deep-sea fishing, fish exports and the increased use of oceans for tourism and other development activities, indicating a rising dependence on blue economic growth. These processes remain weakly regulated or unregulated; they marginalize the artisanal and small-scale fisheries (SSF) sector rooted in vulnerable communities severely hit by poverty and displacement.