Tripura Fisheries Minister Sudhangshu Das on Friday said that his department has sought the intervention of the Union Ministry for recovery measures of the fisheries sector which had suffered body blows because of the devastating August floods. Speaking to the media persons during a state-level review meeting of the department, The Minister said, “The total loss incurred by the fishery sector is estimated to be worth Rs 1,350 crore. The state government had released Rs 10 crore for providing instant help to the fishermen who are at the receiving end of the flood caused devastation.
Apart from that, we have already submitted a detailed report to the state government on the losses and during my visit to Delhi, I have personally spoken to the Union Ministry for the allocation of funds so that this sector could revive and the fishermen could be helped financially in the distressing times.” According to Das, the Centre has assured him of full support after examining the demands and proposals advanced from state’s end. On the review meeting, Das said, “This is the second state level review meeting of the department. We shall discuss the progress of project deadlines we had set in the last review meeting and how we can improve our production.
Tripura needs around 1.15 lakh metric tons of fish against which 83,000 metric tons are produced locally. For the rest, we are dependent on states like Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and a very negligible amount of fish comes from Bangladesh. Because of the internal problems in Bangladesh, the imports are very low in the last couple of months.”