RI losses $2b a year in fishing resources

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia's fishing resources need greater protection because potential export revenue of between US$1 billion and $2 billion is lost each year through illegal foreign fishing, a maritime expert said yesterday.

Ambassador-at-large on sea/maritime law Hasjim Djalal said the nation's protection of its vast territorial waters should be improved.

Hasjim suggested greater funding.

Noting that Indonesia annually earned $2 billion from fishing exports, he said the country could set aside $50 million of that revenue to improve its maritime protection capability.

He listed law enforcement, and greater coordination between law enforcement agencies and local fishing communities as other measures the government needed to look at.

Local fishermen should report any suspicious seeming foreign fishing boats to the authorities, he said.

Hasjim was speaking during a break of a seminar discussion on the empowerment of the fishing community, which was organized by the Indonesian Institute of Sciences.

He suggested foreign fishing boats operating in Indonesian waters could be forced to install transponders. He said this was a common practice in other countries.

Monitoring foreign fishing boats' operations could be centralized, he said.

There are 7,000 foreign fishing boats of 60 gross tons to 300 gross tons operating in Indonesian waters and the Exclusive Economic Zone, including some chartered by Indonesian companies.

The government has said it will ban foreign fishing boats from operating in Indonesian waters beginning in 2000.

In the seminar, Hasjim said he was concerned that people had misconstrued the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea's Article 62 on the utilization of living resources.

The article says that a coastal state which does not have the capacity to harvest its entire allowable catch, could give other states access to the surplus of the allowable catch in the exclusive economic zone.

Hasjim said the article did not automatically guarantee other states access to Indonesia's exclusive economic zone.

They have to comply with terms and conditions established by Indonesia, he said.

Indonesia can regulate the licensing of fishing boats, determine which species may be caught, regulate fishing seasons and areas, and even the landing of all or any part of the catch by vessels in the ports of the coastal state, he said. (10)