Illegal fishing at alarming level

YOGYAKARTA: Minister of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Rokhmin Dahuri said here on Monday the alarming level of illegal fishing practices here in Indonesian waters had discouraged cooperation with neighboring countries.

Due to the rampant illegal fishing in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), only two out of six countries invited to cooperate were willing to sign maritime economic agreements with Indonesia.

The two countries were China and the Philippines, while the four others refusing to sign an agreement were Thailand, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.

"It makes sense that they refuse to sign such an agreement because even without doing so they can still fish here, can't they? So why should they bother," Dahuri said.

Quoting FAO data in 2001, Dahuri said that the total amount of fish catches taken through illegal fishing practices in Indonesia reached over 1.5 million of tons a year.

According to Dahuri, this was made possible due to a deregulation issued by the Ministry of Agriculture in 1996. The deregulation was initially aimed at empowering domestic fishermen.

To prevent illegal fishing, several techniques have been adopted, including the strengthening of the national marine fleet, law enforcement and fishing control and implementation of strict fishing licenses for foreign fishing vessels.

The fishery sector and its processing industry contributed 9.7 percent to the national gross domestic income (PDB) or Rp 38.6 billion in 2001. -- JP