A number of options are being worked out to accelerate the implementation of the Rs.1,621-crore deep sea fishing project whose goal is to resolve the vexatious Palk Bay dispute between the fishing communities of Tamil Nadu and the Northern Province in Sri Lanka. The State Fisheries Department and the Cochin Shipyard, billed as the country’s largest shipbuilding and maintenance utility that comes under the control of the Union Ministry of Shipping, are currently engaged in developing a suitable type of deep sea fishing boat. The project, envisaging the conversion of 2,000 trawlers into tuna liner-cum-gillnet fishing vessels, is expected to help transition the fishermen to deep sea fishing, benefiting nearly 14,000 fishermen. To be implemented over three years, the project will, initially, pave the way for the production of 500 such vessels. About 10 days ago, when Madhu S. Nair, Chairman and Managing Director of the central undertaking, was in Chennai, State government officials led by K. Gopal, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries Secretary, had a detailed discussion with him. At present, the priority is to come up with the right prototype boat at the earliest. Once this is done, other aspects will fall in place. It is expected that in three to four months, at least 25 boats will be ready, says a senior official in the Fisheries Department, adding that these boats, when used by fishermen, may serve as demo pieces and expedite project execution. Besides, the State government is planning to assemble a section of the total requirement of vessels. While it has proposed to empanel boat builders, it is also getting in touch with suppliers of accessories such as marine and auxiliary engines, refrigeration unit and slurry ice units. In addition, a training programme on deep sea fishing has been initiated for the fishermen. In the first batch, as many as 76 fishers took part in the training. They were among the 250 fishermen chosen for the project. As part of giving forward and backward linkages, the State fisheries officials are mulling providing arrangements for the export of fish catch. The target catch for deep sea fishing will essentially be tuna and mackerel, which enjoy a huge demand in the international market. An official makes it clear that there would be no relaxation of the main stipulation, which is the conversion of trawlers into deep sea fishing vessels. Also, there will be little change in the composition of shares of institutional finance (20%) and beneficiary (10%) in the vessel’s unit cost, which is ?80 lakh. The remaining 70% will come from Central and State governments. Bright future Pointing out that several fishermen of Kanniyakumari district have mastered this method and that they are providing their technical expertise to other countries such as Maldives, another official in the State Fisheries department says, let them [Ramanathapuram fishermen] involve themselves fully in the project as they will increasingly be catering to the international market once they migrate to deep sea fishing.