The Philippines-based non-governmental organization, Tambuyog Development Center, said that data from the National Statistical Co-ordination Board show that municipal fishers make up the poorest sector in the country with a poverty incidence of 41.4 per cent in 2009.
In a statement, Tambuyog executive director Arsenio Tanchuling said that this was even higher than the poverty incidence among farmers, which stood at 36.7 per cent in 2009.
“The widespread poverty among fishers can be remedied only by implementing urgent
reforms, and President Aquino himself must see to it that these
reforms are carried out effectively by the Department of Agriculture (DA) and the
Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR), together with the local government units,” Tanchuling said.
He noted that initially, two urgent reforms must be implemented as prerequisites to all other fisheries programmes on poverty alleviation and fisheries management.
He explained that one of these reforms is to improve and complete the registration of municipal fisherfolk in about 700 coastal municipalities around the country, since this is mandated by the 1998 Fisheries Code and Executive Order 305 issued in 2006.
“The municipal fisherfolk need to be registered so that they will be recognized as a legitimate social and economic sector. As it is, unregistered municipal fishers cannot avail themselves of government services and support, including assistance in times of natural calamities and economic
emergencies”, Tanchuling said.
Tanchuling said that another urgent reform needed is to update the fisheries development plan known as the Comprehensive National Fisheries Integrated Development Plan (CNFIDP).
“The present CNFIDP does not give priority to the development needs of the municipal fisheries subsector. One area that is being neglected is the integration of the municipal fisherfolk along the value chain by organizing them into fisherfolk co-operatives that will consolidate and add value to their products. By developing fish processing and marketing assistance through these co-operatives, municipal fishers will have the incentive to diversify their livelihoods. They will no longer just be dependent on capture fisheries”, he explained.
Tanchuling said that after fishers are registered and organized into co-operatives and began to diversify their livelihoods, fisheries management measures will become more effective and easier to implement because municipal fishers will have fallback livelihood options besides fishing.
He added that municipal fishers, at this point, will be able to “fish less for more” value.