KARACHI, March 6: The sea environment and economy was the focus with piracy being the most discussed topic on day two of the 5th international maritime conference titled ‘Regional maritime security dynamics imperatives and inter-dependencies’ at the Bahria University here on Wednesday.

“Currently there are seven ships and 113 hostages under the control of Somali pirates,” Dr Lucia Fanning, director of the marine affairs programme at the Dalhousie University, Canada, brought the subject home at the start of her presentation: ‘An integrated approach to disrupting the piracy business model in the horn of Africa’.

“Historically, and today, the major motivating factor behind maritime piracy is economical or financial gain. In the current Somalia-based piracy, the major reward comes from the ransom paid for the release of ship and crew, though other piracy in the Indian Ocean also concentrates on the plunder of dhows and local fishing vessels,” she said.

“Piracy has evolved from an opportunistic crime involving local seafaring and fisheries communities to a well-organised business.”

Replying to a question, Dr Fanning pointed out that it was also very difficult to track the pirates through the money trail as the ransom money itself did not move as it was just circulating in the local environment. “Money that can be tracked, though it is complicated, is the money going to the negotiators in London or the USA,” she said and added that in Somalia there was a sense of righteousness to the money.

“Buying charcoal, putting money in sheep, etc, is how the money is laundered. It is not used for buying drugs. So giving them marked notes also won’t work,” senior scientist Dr Stanley Byron Weeks said.

Moazzam Khan, technical adviser to the Marine Fisheries, World Wide Fund, gave a presentation on the ‘Impact of Somali piracy on the fisheries of Pakistan’.

“The fisheries sector of Pakistan is mainly of small-scale and artisanal in nature, comprising about 11,300 boats mainly using gillnet, trawl, seine and line gears. Tuna gillnetters are around 500 vessels producing 40,000 million tins annually, 95 per cent of which is exported to Iran. The gillnet fleet mainly targets coastal and open ocean tuna resources,” he explained.

“Pakistan and Iran vessels as well prefer to fish in Somali waters as the quantity of various types of tuna is manifold there,” he said. “The first Pakistani vessel was hijacked in 1994, and recently, 15 vessels have been hijacked in Somalia. But after 2008, Somali piracy has brought about a major change in the fishing pattern in Pakistan because the Pakistani fleet stopped operating in Somalian waters.

“Offshore tuna fleet aiming large pelagics is either operating close to the Pakistan coast or in offshore areas near the Indian border. Similarly, just because of piracy some of these vessels are operating in the exclusive economic zones of island countries of the southern Indian Ocean. Their operation in coastal waters of Pakistan has tremendously increased pressure on the fish stocks in shallow waters and resulted in high instances of by-catch. Operations of vessels from distant water fishing nations has also pretty much stopped in the exclusive economic zone of Pakistan so excessive pressure on stocks of yellowfin tuna has been reduced. Somali piracy, meanwhile, has fuelled an illegal trade of fish and fuel with Iran.

Khillat Bari Malik, managing director of the Corporate Media Associates Limited, read out his paper, 'Enterprise and innovation in the maritime sector'. WWF Pakistan director Dr Ejaz Ahmed read out his paper on the ‘Conservation of marine resources and mitigation of environmental degradation in the Arabian Sea region’.

Dr Ishrat Hussain, the chief guest on the occasion, spoke about how maritime resources interacted with the world economy, the growing power of globalisation and international trade by freights and ships.