KARACHI, Sept 20: A high-level committee comprising chief secretaries of Balochistan and Sindh governments and the federal food and agricultural secretary has been formed to decide on issues of granting fishing rights to the vessels that operate in Pakistani territorial waters and exploit rich tuna resource.

The committee was formed at the Inter Provincial Coordination Committee that met on August 28 in Islamabad with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz in chair.

Balochistan and Sindh governments have long standing complaints against the federal food and agricultural ministry for issuing licences to Taiwanese industrial fishing trawlers that exploit rich resource of tuna fish in their territorial sea limits and are causing an immense loss to the small fishermen of their provinces.

“The Balochistan government demanded an immediate rejection of the 27 applications for fishing permissions by giant foreign industrial trawlers in Arabian sea,” Syed Sher Jan Baloch, Balochistan Minister for Provincial Coordination, told Dawn by telephone on Wednesday. The minister, who attended the last IPCC meeting, said his province and that of Sindh demanded an immediate decentralisation of giving fish rights from the federal government to the two provinces.

“Balochistan has 1,100km coastline, while Sindh has about 800km coast with Arabian sea and have, therefore, demanded that the authority of giving fishing rights be given to these two provinces,” Sher Jan said and disclosed that his position was supported by Punjab and NWFP in the IPCC meeting.

In a detailed presentation, the Balochistan government presented its case in the name of piracy of tuna fish and starvation of Balochistan fishermen. The plea is that almost 30 per cent of fishermen of Balochistan are involved in harvesting of tuna fish for ages. These fishermen got the first blow in 1994 when a large number of industrial fish trawlers were given licences. “These trawlers literally depleted the sea of Tuna fish, as harvest went down steeply for the next 10 years to 2004,” Sher Jan said.

“What is alarming for us that the federal food and agricultural ministry plans to issue 26 licences again to the Taiwanese trawlers through the same broker who was involved 10 years ago,” the minister added. The prime minister has now formed a high-level committee to resolve the issue of granting fishing rights.

“In 1994 and 1995, about 20 large industrial vessels were similarly changed to Pakistani flags but all these ships sailed off after a rich tuna haul, causing immense losses to our fishermen,” the minister recalled. He said these trawlers had giant-sized nets that hauled a big pack of fish. “Many of the dead fish are thrown back in the sea by these trawlers that spread disease among healthy fish,” he said.

The Balochistan assembly too adopted a resolution unanimously that demanded cancellation of fishing rights of all big industrial trawlers in the territorial waters of the province. “The foreigners should not be allowed to take away our precious tuna catch and deprive local fishermen of its legitimate source of income,” the minister asserted.

The territorial water limits of Balochistan are also being increased from 12 nautical miles to 20 miles nautical, while the national territorial water limit or exclusive economic zone extends up to 200 nautical miles.