Govt takes aim at illegal fishing

JAKARTA (JP): The newly appointed Director General of Fisheries, Rear Admiral F.X. Murdjijo, pledged yesterday to step up security and control in Indonesia's territorial waters to eliminate illegal fishing practices.

"I will strive to eliminate illegal fishing and to do this, I will intensify cooperation with the Navy. The Navy chief has vowed to support me in this," Murdjijo said after a ceremony for his installation.

Apart from Murdjijo, Minister of Agriculture Sjarifudin Baharsjah yesterday also installed Syamsuddin Abbas as secretary to the ministry's mass supervision program, Silvia Marsudi, as the head of the agro-business agency and Mochtar Abdullah as the head of the ministry's education and training agency.

Murdjijo said that the Navy would soon own a number of aircraft specifically aimed at helping the supervision and control of territorial waters.

Responding to questions about the possibility of importing second-handed fishing vessels, Murdjijo stressed that any decision could only be made after discussions between several related institutions, including the Ministry of Transportation.

He acknowledged, however, that up to 50 percent of the country's marine resources have been illegally carried away by foreign fishing fleets, due to the lack of local large-scale fishing vessels.

"If we step up our efforts to prevent these illegal actions, we can expect to reduce the amount of thefts," he said.

Murdjijo said about a year was required to build a single fishing vessel measuring 100 gross tons or more.

"We urgently need many large-sized vessels to cover our exclusive economic zone (EEZ)," he said.

Sjarifudin yesterday reiterated that deregulations would only be made to cut back red tape on fishing procedures, and not on the importation of secondhand fishing vessels.

"Our domestic manufacturers are already capable of making 30 to 60 gross-ton ships. It is these sizes, and not the larger ones, which are most needed by our fishermen," he said yesterday.

Sjarifudin pointed out that cutting back red tape would be enough to encourage large-scale entrepreneurs to increase their fishing activities.

"Deregulations towards the simplification of licensing procedures are enough to increase our national fishing capacity," he said. (pwn)