KARACHI, Jan 17: Fish exporters have threatened to suspend purchase of fish and fishery products from the market from Jan 24 if one of the officials of the Marine Fisheries Department (MFD) does not apologise for his alleged misconduct with an exporter.

Exporters and the MFD had been at loggerheads and last month the Pakistan Seafood Industries Association demanded that the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock (MINFAL) remove the MFD director-general for “his lack of knowledge on the subject coupled with his failure to address export issues, especially the ban imposed by the EU last year”.

A few days back a fish exporter went to the MFD to complain against an MFD inspector “for taking many hours in inspecting and finally making a mistake in the certificate”. He met the MFD’s deputy director, Abdul Jabbar, who reportedly “abused the exporter saying that all the exporters are thieves and corrupt”.

To sort out the issue, a delegation of the PSIA met the MFD director-general on Thursday and complained about the “intolerable behaviour” of the official, but the DG tried to dig up other issues, ignoring the complaint.

PSIA chairman Sardar Hanif Khan said the DG had not heard the exporters and refused to take any action against the deputy director. Later, the exporters walked out of the meeting.

Initially, soon after the meeting with the DG, the exporters had decided to discontinue purchase of fish from the markets immediately, but they discussed the matter with Fishermen Cooperative Society Administrator Tahir Dada before taking any action, which might affect the livelihood of fishermen, he said, adding that the FCS higher up had promised to take up the matter with MINFAL.