KARACHI, March 2: The State Bank of Pakistan has devised a detailed plan to finance the fisheries sector which, it said, has an ‘export potential of $1 billion’ annually and it can go further high with better planning.

A 13-page report carried out by the SBP’s research team on agriculture suggested numerous steps to tap the large potential of ‘catches’ in the waters of sea and rivers of the country.

The report said fisheries was the most ignored area of agriculture which receives bank credits just 0.4 per cent of the total agricultural credit disbursements.

Fisheries contributes only 0.3 per cent to the overall GDP and 1.3 per cent to the agricultural GDP despite a coastline of 1,050 km and a total area of approximately 0.25 million square kilometres of marine and 0.08 million sq km of inland waters consisting of rivers, streams, canals, drains, abandoned canals and farms.

There have been moves in the government circles for improvement of fisheries sector for more than a decade.

During the previous government, SMEDA made tall claims to restructure the fisheries sector, but still no signs of change appeared in the sector.

“The share of fisheries in total export earnings stood at 0.9 per cent (US$160 million) during the year.

Fisheries sector has domestic consumption potential of one million metric tons and export of US$ 1 billion annually,” said the SBP report.

The sector has been a victim of ban by the foreign countries, including the biggest importer European Union. Recently the EU, which imports 50 per cent fish products of Pakistan, banned 10 Pakistani companies to export fish to the region.

Experts said the situation could further aggravate if the catching, saving, cleaning and packaging systems were not improved up to the international standard.

The report said during 2005-06, the total marine and inland fish production stood at 0.6 million metric tons, of which 63 per cent was marine production and the remaining 37 per cent catch came from inland waters.

Fifty per cent of the total production i.e. 0.3mmt was consumed locally, 0.12mmt of fish and fish products were exported and 0.18mmt of the fish production was used as fish meal.

The report said the fisheries sector provides direct employment to about 379,000 fishermen and 400,000 people are employed in ancillary industries.

The State Bank research report suggested that the working capital should be provided to purchase fuel, ration and ice, overhead expenses i.e. labour, packaging, processing and cleaning items required for export of fish.

Credit for consumable items for curing and drying would also be provided while a long list of items regarding freezing, packaging charges, etc. was produced to banks for financing.

Loans can be extended to individuals, fishermen, fish farmers, corporate firms, cooperative societies/self-help groups, fish catching/ processing /packaging companies and fish exporters having sufficient knowledge and relevant experience, the report said.

However, the criteria set for borrowing by individuals, like poor fishermen, were not different from others who have credit worthiness. The individual fishermen usually have nothing to mortgage while providing guarantor would be another problem for uneducated poor fishermen. The opening of bank account would prove another hurdle.

The main purpose of the report, guidelines, was to encourage farmers to adopt modern and efficient fish farming techniques and facilitate banks in developing an internal expertise and products for fisheries financing, said the SBP.