Johan Rosihan Presents Study on Protection of Small-Scale Fishermen
A thesis presentation on Legal Service Work at the Master’s programme in Legal Studies at Universitas 17 Agustus 1945 (UTA 45) Jakarta sparked cross-sectoral discussion concerning the fate of Indonesia’s 2.2 million small-scale fishermen. The presentation by postgraduate student Johan Rosihan was titled “Legal Politics of Maritime Spatial Governance: Protecting Small-Scale Fishermen Amid Investment Expansion and Administrative Regulation”.
The presentation highlighted the paradox of protecting small-scale fishermen amid coastal investment expansion. In his exposition, Johan emphasised that Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago nation, has yet to provide adequate protection for small-scale fishermen, the majority of whom operate vessels below 10 gross tonnes with simple equipment.
He identified three structural factors weakening protection for small-scale fishermen: asymmetrical representation in policymaking, fragmented authority among agencies, and weak law enforcement in remote coastal regions.
“Law does not exist in neutral space. It is a product of power relations that determine who gains access, who is protected, and who is marginalised,” Johan stated in a written statement on Friday, 27 February 2026.
The discussion, held on Thursday, 26 February, brought diverse perspectives from practitioners at PT Pelindo, the port facilities subsidiary of PT Krakatau Steel, financial analysts, and students from Maluku and East Nusa Tenggara.
Johan emphasised that conflict between large-scale investment and small-scale fishermen is not a permanent dichotomy, but rather results from the absence of equitable negotiation forums and consistent rules of engagement.
He proposed an integrated value chain model, with small-scale fishermen as upstream catch collectors, cooperatives or state-owned enterprises as mid-stream aggregators, and Pelindo facilities as downstream export gateways.
The issue of border-area fishermen also emerged, particularly regarding arrests by Australian authorities. Johan attributed this to the narrowing of fishing grounds resulting from investment expansion, along with insufficient dissemination of the Indonesia-Australia Memorandum of Understanding concerning traditional fishermen’s access rights.
On fiscal matters, Johan proposed earmarking mechanisms for fisheries revenue-sharing funds to protect small-scale fishermen through revision of the regional revenue-sharing law, local government regulation of budgets, and utilisation of village development funds.
“The fiscal instruments already exist. What is missing is the political will to lock them in legally so they are not redirected to other budget items,” he stated.
The study formulated three regulatory reform recommendations. First, to the Indonesian Parliament and Government to harmonise maritime spatial governance regulations with fishermen’s rights protection as a non-negotiable boundary.
Second, to the Coordinating Ministry for Maritime Affairs, the Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, the Ministry of Agrarian Affairs and Spatial Planning, and local governments to establish cross-sectoral coordination mechanisms and accelerate implementation of the Coastal and Small Island Zone Planning (RZWP3K) programme that recognises traditional fishing grounds.
Third, to the Supreme Court, the Judicial Commission, legal aid organisations, and universities to develop progressive jurisprudence and expand legal aid access to remote coastal regions.
“As long as small-scale fishermen continue to be treated as objects of development—rather than active legal subjects—coastal justice will remain an unfulfilled promise,” Johan concluded.