KARACHI, Oct 31: Fifteen medium sized vessels have brought in a load of around 1,456 tons of fish catch at Korangi Fish Harbour (KFH) during last four months (July-Oct). The estimated value of the catch has been put at $1.456 million in the world market.

As a result of berthing facility given to these vessels, Korangi Fish Harbour has earned about Rs9 million in revenue during this period.

A spokesman for the harbour told Dawn that during four months it earned around Rs3.225 million towards commission on landed fish catch at a rate of $40 per ton, around Rs95,000 as berthing fee and development cess Rs5.725 million.

Under the Fishing Policy 2001, the government has allowed 20 medium sized and 10 large sized trawlers to operate between 12 to 35 nautical miles (NM) of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).

However, so far 15 medium sized vessels, each having a capacity between 100 and 250 GRT (gross registered tonnage), were issued licences to operate for deep-sea fishing in zone II of the EEZ, while no owner of large sized trawler with 300 to 500 GRT has so far approached for getting licence.

Most of these trawlers are of Chinese and Korean origin. In total, 27 trips have been made by ten vessels from July 2002, and unloaded a fish catch of around 1,334 tons. Therefore, average fish catch of each trawler came to around 55 ton.

Out of the remaining five vessels two are under licensing and documentation process, while three made single trip bringing in a total catch of around 122 ton.

At present an average price of fish in the world market stands at around $1,000 per ton, which means fish catch worth $1.456 million has been exported during the last four months.

The government has laid down strict check in the new fishing policy in order to discourage illegal finishing, which in the past had caused huge revenue losses as well as of the fish resources. There had been a common practice by trawlers to throw away all such catch in the open sea which does not fall under their requirement and standard.

To monitor the implementation of such conditions, the National Fisheries Development Board (NFDB) has made it mandatory upon each trawler to install a tracking system called ‘Global Positioning Satellite Based Tracking System.’

The board has also enhanced the penalties on violations of deep sea fishing by trawlers from Rs0.2 million to Rs10 million as well as penalty on fishing beyond the period of the validity of the licence. The licence fee has also been increased from Rs0.5 million to one million rupees.

However, there is a general complain from the deep sea trawlers that harvesting of fish is not encouraging this season, it may be, due to change in climate of the region.