KARACHI: The federal government has started the process of inviting tenders for deep-sea fishing this year amid concerns expressed by local fishermen over depleting fish resources, it emerged on Thursday.

Offering 100 licences to trawlers in different categories depending on their capacity of catch, the government will allow deep-sea trawlers to operate within the Exclusive Economic Zone of Pakistan.

While the government invites tenders from time to time, there has been no fishing by foreign deep-sea trawlers since 2006. Multiple reasons such as high fuel prices, depleting stocks and strict monitoring of officially assigned sea limits are cited for the lack of interest by foreign trawlers which had been operating with the help of local companies until 2006.

Highlighting fishermen’s concerns over deep-sea trawling, Mohammad Ali Shah who heads the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum said that local fishermen opposed the operation because it would further deplete fish stocks — the main source of livelihood for thousands of fishermen.

“We are in a state of crisis as fish stocks have already declined by 70pc and if the government started giving licences, the situation will only worsen,” he said, explaining that the mechanized vessels with large nets operating round the clock would jeopardize fish resources.

The PFF chief demanded end to deep-sea fishing policy forever.

According to him, the international limits assigned for deep-sea fishing is between 35 and 200 nautical miles but the government revised and reduced it multiple times in the past compromising interests of local fishermen.

He alleged that there was no monitoring system to ensure compliance of deep-sea trawlers to the officially assigned sea limits.

“Previously when they operated we often used to get complaints that they were fishing in the creeks [breeding grounds of fish species] and damaging nets and boats of local fishermen,” he explained.

He said another major issue, rather a global one, was the huge wastage of non-targeted species caught by deep-sea trawlers. “They keep only 10 per cent of the targeted catch and throw the rest in the sea, thereby degrading marine environment,” he said.

However, World Wide Fund for Nature-Pakistan technical adviser on marine resources Mohammad Moazzam Khan said the operation of deep-sea trawlers was a non-issue. Instead, he said, the focus should be on the rampant malpractices of local fishermen who were reportedly using all kinds of harmful nets and destroying fish resources themselves.“Even if deep-sea trawlers were responsible for the depletion of stocks, the fish should have been rehabilitated by now because there has been no operation of such trawlers for the past eight to nine years,” he argued.

He was of the opinion that the government should exploit the Exclusive Economic Zone, over which a state had special rights to explore and use of marine resources under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. “If it doesn’t, then, it should allow land-locked regional countries to exploit it. This is what the Law of the Sea says,” he said.

Giving a background of deep-sea fishing in Pakistan, Mr Khan said it was launched here in 1982 but stopped four years later only to resume after some time. Then it was banned for only two months during former President Musharraf’s rule who, he said, was shown false data on deep-sea trawlers.

“As the catch by deep-sea fishing comprises only two per cent of our total fish production, it’s completely baseless to say that these trawlers are responsible for destroying our marine resources,” the WWF adviser explained.

In fact when local fishermen themselves took vessels to the deep-sea for catch it’s wrong to blame deep-sea trawlers, he said.

When contacted, Marine Fisheries Department Director General Shaukat Hussain said that the government had invited mid-water trawlers which used tuna long-line and squid jigging (fishing gears) along with purse seiners and hoped to receive a good feedback this year.

The officer said that the government had received 10 to 12 applications last year also but all of them were rejected as their relevant documents were incomplete.

Mr Hussain was of the opinion that strict vigilance through a satellite-based monitoring vessel could be a reason for investors’ lack of interest in deep-sea fishing.

“Earlier, deep-sea trawlers used to violate the sea limits assigned to them and often fished in shallow waters that led to a conflict between local fishermen and trawlers,” he recalled.

He claimed the government wanted to introduce responsible and environment-friendly fishery practices aimed at revising deep-sea fishing policy in collaboration with stakeholders to encourage investors.

Mr Hussain admitted that fish stocks were depleting but argued that they were more endangered by use of harmful nets by local fishermen.