Adrift in the fishless seas

Adrift in the fishless seas

When fish disappear, so do fishermen. Millions of Asians who depend on the sea may soon be out of work. Mukul Sharma reports for Inter Press Service.

COCHIN: Indian yellowfin tuna and skipjack may soon be more common in the supermarket shelves of Japan and Europe than in the thousands of fishing villages that dot this country's vast coast.

Fisherfolk living near this town at India's southern tip depend entirely on the daily catch for food and cash income. As they sail back to shore these days, their nets more and more empty.

In the last thirty years, uncontrolled trawl fishing for export and coastal pollution have severely depleted the fishing grounds of the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal -- affecting millions of fisherfolk in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand and Malaysia.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), three-quarters of the region's fish stocks have been depleted or over-exploited. The fish shortage is now so severe that it is starting to strain relations between countries in the region.

Thailand's relations with Myanmar and Malaysia have both been affected by fishing disputes. In India, traditional fisherfolk are under increasing pressure to adopt more intensive and less selective techniques as a result of the opening up of the country's Exclusive Economic Zone to joint ventures between foreign and Indian companies.

"Traditional fishermen are most seriously affected due to increased competition from small trawlers, which unable to go to the deep seas because of foreign vessels will stay in inshore waters," explains Thomas Kocherry of the National Fishworkers' Forum and convenor of a forum against joint ventures.

The government is said to have issued 180 licenses to joint ventures with foreign fishing fleets, and some are beginning to start operations.

India's organized fishing communities have responded with a series of strikes. In February, the government was forced to halt the issue of new licenses, and order the setting up of a high- powered committee to review New Delhi's deep sea fishing policy.

Fishworker's unions now have enlisted the support of India's trade unions. In a rare show of unity, the unions have sunk their differences and decided to call for an all-India fisheries strike on Jan. 18, 1996.

Top of their demands is that the government cancel the licenses of joint ventures. The deep sea fishing policy will, they fear, add to the country's huge unemployment problem, undermine the fishing communities and deplete the resource base.

An estimated 7.5 million people depend, either directly or indirectly, on small-scale fishing and related activities like fish marketing, curing and processing, for their livelihood.

Fishing communities are among the country's poorest.

"All the foreign vessels should go out from the Indian sea. And there can be no compromise with the government on this," said K.V. Thomas, a member of Parliament from the ruling Congress party, speaking at the Cochin meeting.

And V.P. Marakar, secretary of INTUC, the union aligned to the ruling Congress, said: "The deep sea fishing policy is creating unemployment. The traditional fishing sector should be left undisturbed, so that the fishing community is not thrown out of jobs."

The unions, each aligned to a political party, have said the government must frame a deep sea fishing policy that will primarily benefit traditional fisherfolk.

As a result of liberalization policies, the government announced changed its deep sea fishing policy in March 1991. The new policy allowed foreign fishing vessels into Indian waters beyond 12 nautical miles (18 km) of the coast.

This was followed up with a variety of incentives, including concessions and subsidies, to attract investors. Apart from allowing the duty free import of vessels, the government decided to permit the sale of diesel at international prices. Also the vessels can transfer the catch on the high seas, and bunker.

"The policy has already created many serious setbacks and consequences for the Indian fishermen," said Kocherry of the NFF. "Our fishermen are deprived of the catch in the deep seas, which was their territory."

Even India's coastal states are unhappy with the government policy. Kerala also wants the government to allow the state jurisdiction up to 24 nautical miles (30 km) of the coast. At present the state's control extends only up to 12 nautical miles (18 km).

The government of Gujarat state, further up the west coast of India, has rapped the government for granting licenses without taking into consideration the interest of traditional fisherfolk.

Shifts in government policy in favor of outside investors, has played havoc with traditional fishers elsewhere in South Asia.

The ultimate irony is when fishermen eat fish off a can. And this is happening in parts of Sri Lanka, where it is now common to see foreign brand-name tuna cans for sale in shops in fishing villages. Fish shortage has affected the protein intake of Sri Lankan children.

In Bangladesh, fish availability has declined from 33 gms per day per person in 1962-63 to about 21 gms today. Even the Maldives archipelago which has so far protected its marine wealth with strict rules on fishing, is now going to allow foreign trawlers to drag their nets through its waters.

-- IPS