Fishermen of the inland waters of Punjab, Khyber Pukhtunkhwa, Balochistan and Sindh have demanded to phase out bottom trawling from territorial waters for the next five years. The fishermen’s request is prompted by the negative impacts that bottom trawling has on marine ecology, biodiversity and marine fishery resources.
Representatives of the fishing community from all four provinces attended the national workshop, which was organized by the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF). The workshop developed the Voluntary Guidelines on Small Scale Fisheries (VG-SSF), which follows suggestions from the Food and Agriculture Organisation’s (FAO) Committee on Fisheries (COFI).
Sindh Fisheries Minister Zahid Ali Bhurgari, FAO Technical Advisor Paul Fanning, Managing Director Karachi Fisheries Harbour Authority Abdul Ghani Jokhio, Deputy Director Marine Fisheries Department Ansar A. Hashmi, Director General Balochistan Fisheries Mohammed Noor, Director Livestock and Fisheries Sindh Khawar Awan and Director Inland Fisheries Ghulam Mujtaba Wadhar, all gave their input while the suggestions were being drafted. PFF Chairperson Mohammed Ali Shah, Hussain Jarwar, Saeed Baloch, Mustafa Gurgaz, Fiza Qureshi and others also spoke on the occasion.
Fishermen from 30 different countries are currently in the process of designing a comprehensive set of recommendations. The FAO is to finalize the draft, which is to be in effect till July 2014, and will give governments responsibility for preserving fish stocks and safeguarding the basic rights of local communities.
The PFF has already organised four regional workshops in Hyderabad and Sukkur for inland fishers and in Karachi and Gawadar, Baluchistan for marine fishers. The workshops indentified a number of issues, including certain types of harmful nets and the need for different sized boats to make fishing sustainable in marine and inland waters. The workshops also introduced the slogan One family, one boat’.
Sindh Fisheries Minister Zahid Ali Bhurgari appreciated the efforts made by PFF in identifying and documenting these issues and assured PFF that he would take up legislation for protecting the rights of the fishermen. He also gave a list of schemes that the provincial government had launched in various areas.
Paul Fanning said that the FAO has already carried out similar exercises for designing guidelines that efforts were now being made to improve governance in the sector. He pointed out that the implementation of these guidelines is the responsibility of the government of Pakistan, and not the UN.
Earlier, during a brainstorming session on small scale fisheries, the participants concluded that fish reserves in the sea have declined, and that this problem needs to be addressed by adopting a code of conduct for responsible fisheries.’
There are various laws, ordinances and fishery policies, but due to a lack of implementation, the livelihoods of the local people have been thrown in jeopardy, they said. Community-based organizations may be involved in regulating a number of fishing vessels at the local level. Community consent may be taken before registering a new fishing vessel, the fishermen suggested.
The fishermen called upon the government to ensure locals with diversified livelihoods and to provide them appropriate training for fishing communities to reduce pressure on the fishery sector. They acknowledged that the sea is quickly being depleted and that degradation of lakes is also a problem that is affecting fishermen from all provinces of Pakistan. They also pointed out that they have no say in the process of policy and decision making. Due to this, the community people are facing poverty and vulnerability.
They said that fishing has a long tradition in Pakistan, and that social development issues are common to nearly all the traditional fishing communities. They said that about four million people are directly dependent on fisheries of Pakistan for their livelihood. The participants also discussed the role of women within fisheries and urged the need for a focus on supporting and empowering them.
They suggested the government make appropriate arrangements to facilitate utilization of water bodies such as ponds, lakes, wetlands, reservoirs and canals for the purpose of fishing. They acknowledged that there should be an inter-departmental co-ordination mechanism to address issues like marine and inland pollution and encroachment. They have asked for fishery departments to take up this responsibility.
Training programmes should be developed to facilitate improved navigation and fishing methods to reduce fuel consumption and to facilitate the fishing community with initiatives to protect and develop coastal vegetation and features. They suggested reviving and strengthening fisheries’ co-operative societies, and supporting appropriate forms of economic organizations.
They also asked for the establishment of self-help groups (SHGs), for the prevention of child labour in fisheries and for the protection of children’s rights to education. Keeping in mind these suggestions, they urged the government to develop a national policy on small-scale fisheries for the protection of their rights.
The News International , 2012