With a vast area of Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), India needs to be equipped with not only fleets of deep sea trawlers, but it must also have factory ships processing marine products fresh on board in order to exploit at least a part of the marine fisheries that the nature has gifted to this country.
India today has hardly about 60 deep sea trawlers deployed in our EEZ. Interestingly, 40 of them are engaged in non-fishing activities like supply boats to oil rigs, survey ships etc. The remaining 20 are mostly laid up for repairs or unable to continue fishing due to mainly working capital constraints. Hence, practically India has no deep sea trawlers.
Indian EEZ has large stock of yellow fin tuna and big eye tuna. In and around Andaman Sea, such tuna could be of around 130 kg in weight each with an average price of around 20 dollars a kg, fresh tuna, if we develop our infrastructure, India could have easily achieved the export target of 6 billion dollars by 2015. The present scenario is such that Indian waters are continuously being poached by foreign trawlers belonging mainly to Thailand, Taiwan, Indonesia and even Philippine trawlers. Near the Indira point, the southern tip of Andamans, the foreign trawlers not only take away our marine wealth but also the forest produce from the jungles of the island in their trawlers. let alone such wealth, the vast stretch of unattended water areas in our EEZ has become home to the terrorists and smugglers.
On the contrary, the coastal areas are over fished. The North tip of Bay of Bengal, known as Sand Heads, has thousands of small boats constantly fishing by day and night, even up to the mouth of the Ganges and the Brahmaputra during the breeding season, resulting in depletion of certain species like Hilsa. No doubt that one of the richest grounds in the world is the Sand Heads, with mighty rivers like the Ganges and the Brahmaputra releasing food particles for the marine creatures for thousands of years. The deposits of silt carried by these rivers have also made the mouth of the Bay of Bengal shallow with gradual continental shelves, enabling small boats to reach out for their fishing operations.
What we need to focus today is to plan out the introduction of deep sea trawlers and factory ships in the Indian EEZ. like in Argentina, Spain, Japan etc, we encounter factory ships usually known as mother ships, with deep sea trawlers sailing together as a fleet. The trawlers unload their catch in the factory ship which processes and markets the marine products online. The catches can be unloaded in any of the international ports at a given date.
Focusing on Odisha which has about 480 km of coastline and hundreds of landing bases, we need to strengthen our fishing fleet with deep sea trawlers as well. Till date, the State had one registered deep sea trawler, SAI Sadhaba, acquired with finance from OSFC. Eventually this was sold out after seven years of successful operations due to non-availability of working capital to run the trawler. It is a matter of great realisation that our Chief Minister has asked to double the fish output in five years from 2.37 lMT to 4.33 lMT. This is only for the inland fisheries. Such steps are also required to develop the marine catches, mainly through the deployment of deep sea trawlers.
It has also been a matter of great concern that a large part of our coastline in Odisha, which are probably the best suited fishing grounds ,are banned for fishing during the breeding season of Olive Ridley turtles. Areas like Gahiramatha, Rashikuly, Devi and Jatahari sea mouth are probably the best grounds which are under the banned areas. The fishermen in such areas also suffer due to lack of rehabilitation as complained by Odisha Traditional Marine Fish Workers Union (OTFWU).
Due to periodic ban on fishing in the sea on account of turtle protection, more than three lakh traditional marine fishermen spread over 284 fishing villages under six coastal districts of Odisha are living in uncertain future and many of them have migrated outside the State in search of jobs.
Conservation of turtle is important but the fishermen of those areas notified as banned areas need to be rehabilitated sufficiently. The Government of Odisha has launched various schemes for development of fisheries, mainly the inland fisheries. They have even announced 50 per cent subsidy for aqua culture growth under various schemes. Central Institute of Freshwater Aquaculture (CIFA), at Bhubaneswar, is also actively involved in training fishermen and entrepreneurs for the development of fisheries but in spite of all such facilities, why our State is still lagging behind for production of fish to the extent that we look up to Andhra Pradesh and others for providing us our daily requirement of fishes.
On interaction with various fisheries association in the States, it was revealed that most fishermen, though happy with the schemes that the Government of Odisha has launched, most of them are not being implemented in true sense. Besides, the major complaints lie in the availability of need based funding such as term loans to acquire assets and the working capital fund to a fisherman in Odisha to meet the running expenses of his boat. They need funds to buy nets, diesels, provisions, spares and also to meet salary of the crew on board. With the schemes launched by the Government, if the working capital funds are tied up through a cooperative bank or any other scheduled bank, the schemes can finally see the light of the day.
Presently, the woe of the fisherman, borrowing funds from a private money lender and finally landing in a debt trap situation can be avoided.
Many fishermen are forced to work in other States as bonded labourers after losing their boats and livelihood at home. Several fishermen in the past have committed suicide under such debt trap situation. The poverty and the woe of the fishermen in our State can be largely reversed by ensuring need based working capital fund to the fishing community.
It is a matter of regret that out of Rs 776.14 crore allotted by the Centre to the Fisheries and Animal Resources Development Department under the last five year plan, Rs 106.47 crore was refunded to the Centre due to non-utilisation.
With the working capital tie up, the position is bound to improve and the fisheries in the State will flourish, adding substantial revenue to the State income. Besides banks, there are also various other funding agencies and financial institutions, such as National Fisheries Development Board (NFDB), who have dedicated funds for deployment in the fishing sector. The process of availing such fund is so complicated that a poor fisherman is never in a position to derive any loan or grant from the NFDB.
Suggestive Measures:
· The present need is to develop the fishing resources of the country as a part of blue revolution.
· Our country and the States must have an independent ministry of fisheries.
· This Ministry should include inland fisheries, marine fisheries and all fishery associated industries like fish processing, fish farms and fishing implements etc.
· Need based funding in time should be available for fishing projects including periodical working Capital to all such projects on priority basis.
· A budgetary provision should be set up for development of deep sea trawling activities in the Indian EEZ.
· Fishing with lines to be encouraged especially for big and valuable fishes like tuna etc.
· Awareness programmes to be launched to encourage consumption of Marine Products as one of the best sources of proteins to cater to the nutritional requirements of mainly children and women.
(The writer is Managing Director, Sadhoba Marine Pvt ltd E mail: mdsadh-aba@yahoo.com, Mob# 91-9437057659)