Measures to develop the fisheries industry Ridma Dissanayake The fisheries sector makes a huge contribution to the country’s economy in its journey towards achieving development. Sri Lankan fishery industry has 3,150 multi day fishing vessels The fisheries sector plays a key role in Sri Lanka’s social and economic life. Fish products are an important source of animal protein and the sector contributes about 18.35 percent to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). From an economic viewpoint, there is a significant scope for increasing the level of contribution from the sector through increased output, exploiting the potential for value addition and important substitution. The fisheries sector in Sri Lanka consists of three main sub sectors, namely coastal offshore, deep sea and inland and aquaculture. These three sub sectors employ around 250,000 active fishermen and another 100,000 support services. This workforce represents a population of one million people. President Mahinda Rajapaksa initiated development projects while he was the Fisheries Minister and it made a huge contribution to the current development in the fishing industry, said Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Development Minister Dr Rajitha Senaratne. Dr Rajitha Senaratne has keenly grasped the challenge as Fisheries Minister since his appointment in middle of the year 2010. When President was the Fisheries Minister he did a great service to the fisher community by introducing the ‘Diyawara Gammana’ housing programme and ‘Diyawara loans’ scheme. He had paid more attention on fishery technology and fishery education. President Rajapaksa also took steps to uplift the living condition of the fisher community. He has a great knowledge in fishery industry and he also knows the matters in the industry. With the hope of making Sri Lanka the Wonder of Asia he has given the priority to the economic development, the fishery industry and the agriculture field in his ‘Mahinda Chinthana’ concept, he added. As we all know Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Development Minister Dr Rajitha Senaratne is doing a great service with the ministerial staff including Ministry Secretary Damitha de Soysa. The administration staff of the affiliated institutes also have taken several measures in collaboration with the Fisheries Ministry. The minister is to extend the CFC fish stalls’ network while establishing 250 fish stalls in islandwide. The Fisheries Ministry has taken measures to establish CFC fish stalls in each and every city and village along with the CFC with the aim of reducing malnutrition in the country. At present they have established 99 fish stalls and they hope to increase it up to 250 by the year 2013. Minister Dr. Rajitha Senaratne There are six institutes and departments affiliated to the Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Development Ministry. The large number of projects of those institutes and departments has been implemented affiliated to the Fisheries Ministry as well. The Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Development Ministry has the ownership of 17 fishery harbours. Another two harbours are under construction and they have proposed to build another four fishery harbours as well. In addition to that the ministry has 40 anchor lodges, 772 inland water fish landing centres, 790 sea water fish landing centres, 75 ice plants, 20 cool storage, 29 dockyards and six nets and equipment factories. There are 1087 village level fishery organizations and 34 registered fish processing factories as well. Minister Rajitha Senaratne stated that all measures are in place to widen each and every part of the fishery industry and to provide a huge support to the country’s economic development. Every step will be taken for increasing the progress and the efficiency of the fishery community while developing the facilities for them. Maritime zones The Maritime Zones Law of 1976 is the foundation. According to that Sri Lanka has an exclusive economic zone with a width of 200 nautical miles and it covers 517,000 square kilometer area of the sea. There are 45 main culverts and lagoons in the Sri Lankan coastal belt and they covered 160,000 hectares. There is a coastal belt of 1,700 kilo meters around Sri Lanka and the continental shelf which is used for fishery industry close to the coast is widening from 22 to 40 kilometers. The middle scale and small scale permanent reservoirs and tanks are covering 155, 000 hectares and temporary reservoirs are covering an area of 100,000 hectares. According to that the whole inland water reservoirs in Sri Lanka are covering 303,755 hectares of an area of the country. That is a great resource for the Sri Lankan fishery industry. According to the fishing vessel census held in 2008 Sri Lankan fishery industry has 3,150 multi day fishing vessels, 600 one day vessels, 1,790 out boat engine traditional vessels, 18,420 traditional vessels without engines and 7,760 inland water fishing vessels. According to that 50,700 vessels are owned by the Sri Lankan fishery industry. There were 339,730 metric tons of inland water and sea water fish cultivation in the year 2009 and at present it has increased to 400,000 metric tons. All measures are in place to develop the fisheries industry step by step and the Fisheries Ministry aims to increase the fish production in the North and East to 43 percent. The ministry has made plans to win the international sea and they are to double the inland water fish production. Currently inland water fish industry and aquaculture industry are manufacturing 46,560 metric tons of fish production and they are to increase it to 98,000 metric tons in 2013. They are to produce a total fish production of 686,000 metric tons. The Fisheries Ministry has taken measures to provide the modern technical knowledge to the fishery technicians. All measures have been taken to train the fishermen and they will be trained to identify more fish resources by using modern technology through the National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency (NARA). All measures have been taken to introduce a new signal system to identify the maritime borders and it will help the fishermen to fish only in our territorial waters. The ministry has taken measures to prevent Sri Lankan fishermen from crossing the maritime borders and they are to introduce Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) to the fisheries industry to ban Illegal, Unreported and Unregistered (IUU) vessels in the industry. Minister Senaratne has taken measures to introduce VMS system for the Sri Lankan fishery industry while applying tenders from several foreign countries. Around 20 countries have presented the proposals and Sri Lanka has received the opportunity to buy those equipments under a low price rate. This system will pay more attention on identifying the maritime borders, vessel monitoring, identifying areas with more fish and to identify the unknown vessels. The ministry has paid more attention to buy a Vessel Monitoring System with a good quality, modern technology and efficiency service. They also hope to control the illegal things which are doing by some fishing vessels. All measures are in place to initiate inland water aquaculture farming in 8,000 reservoirs with the aim of making a vast development in the inland water fish industry and it will also help double the inland water fish cultivation. ‘When I was appointed as the Fisheries Minister, Ceylon Fisheries Corporation’s monthly income was only Rs 68 million and it sold only fish 185 metric tons per month. But after six months it had been increased by 100 percent and currently they earn Rs 142 million per month while selling 370 metric tons of fish. It had also increased by 100 percent. In the year 2009 the CFC had sold 2,678 metric tons of fish and their income was Rs 795 million. We were able to increase their production by 50 percent in the year 2010 with their assistance. In that year they have sold 3,459 metric tons of fish and they earned Rs 1,196 million as well. While continuing this progress CFC had earned Rs 1,373 million of income by selling 3,506 metric tons of fish at the end of September, 2011. At present it is developing as a profitable institution and they sell around 50 tons of fish per day.’ the minister said. At present the fisheries sector has become the third most important field in the country’s economy. They also hope to develop their affiliated institutions as the profitable state institutions and all measures are in place to buy 90 fishing vessels for the CFC. The minister is to extend the CFC fish stalls’ network while establishing 250 fish stalls in islandwide. The Fisheries Ministry has taken measures to establish CFC fish stalls in each and every city and village along with the CFC with the aim of reducing malnutrition in the country. At present they have established 99 fish stalls and they hope to increase it up to 250 by the year 2013. The CFC fish stalls have helped control the fish price in the market and they help give the fresh fish resource to the consumers. The Fisheries Minister had gone on an inspection tour in Jaffna and he had distributed Rs 20 million among 200 fishermen as low interest rate loans. The fisheries ministry had initiated this programme along with the Bank of Ceylon (BOC) and they have allocated around Rs 100 million for this loan scheme. In addition to that the Fisheries Ministry had distributed equipment sets including boats, fish nets, bicycles, fish boxes, boat engines, chargers and other essential equipment for the fishermen in Jaffna, Karainagar, Mullativu, Kilinochchi and Vavuniya under the guidance of Minister Senaratne. The Fisheries ministry has taken steps to uplift the fisheries industry and the livelihoods in the North and East while establishing the first district office of the Fisheries Department in the Jaffna district. At the same time they have distributed boats, fish nets and other equipment sets for the fishermen in the North province. The ministry had spent Rs 18 million on that project. Two hundred fishermen in Jaffna have received Rs 20 million as loans under the ‘Diyawara Sawiya’ loan scheme. In addition to that fish landing centre development also had been implemented by the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization under the finance support of the Canadian government. A large number of fish landing centres in North and East provinces have been modernized by this project. In addition to that they have built office complexes, community centres, fishery research offices, fishery organization offices and they have also provided other facilities. The ministry has established the National Fishery Organization to uplift the status of the fisher families as well. An insurance scheme and a pension scheme have been introduced for the fishermen. In accordance with that all fishermen who have taken the membership in the national fishery organization will receive a pension of Rs 10,000 after retirement. Currently the branches of National Fisheries organization have been established in each and every district. Over 82,000 fishermen have become members of this organization. The most modern central fish market was opened in Paliyagoda in March, 2011 under the patronage of President Mahinda Rajapaksa. It helps give a good price for the fishermen’s fish production and it is a great opportunity for consumers to buy fish for their daily consumption at a considerable price. Meanwhile the Fisheries ministry has taken measure to provide modern vessels, engines, fishery harbours, anchor lodges, fish landing centres and all other facilities to the fishermen in the North and East. All arrangements have been made to provide loans from small scale to large scale under the ‘Diyawara Sawiya’ and ‘Diyawara Diriya’ loan schemes. While paying four percent of the loan the Fisheries Ministry has taken measures to provide huge release and courage to the fisher community. The Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Development Ministry is to train fishermen on how to increase their fish cultivation while using modern science and technology. The ministry plans to spend Rs 300 million on these training sessions. ‘We hope to double the fish cultivation mainly through developing the industry in the North and East giving such a vast development for the North and East fishery industry. I hope to make the fisheries industry the wonder of Sri Lankan economy while President Rajapaksa is determined to make Sri Lanka the ‘Wonder of Asia’, Minister Rajitha Senaratne said finally.