For the next 52 days the sea belongs to them, yet the fishermen in the traditional sector are a wary lot. Perturbed over a number of factors, from rapidly shrinking catches to random weather warnings and safety challenges, they say they are bracing for a dry season.
“For the last two months, a majority of us are sitting at home as 90% of the boats are returning without any reasonable catch. It’s not easy to cough up the fuel expense without any return and we know we are moving towards harder times. They point out pollution, migration of some species, and certain unanticipated tropical conditions as the reason for this fall in catch. But since 2011 there has been a gradual dip and this time the situation is really bad,” says Jackson Pollayil, State president, Kerala Swatantra Matsyathozhilali Federation.
He adds that this year the traditional fishermen have been left with a sea ravaged by many unscientific and destructive practices, pair trawling topping the list. “Earlier, trawlers never used to engage in pelagic fishing (fishing from upper layers of the open sea), leaving behind a number of species like mackerel and sardine for the traditional sector. But now they do pair trawling using very huge nets sweeping all three levels of the sea. We often see them dumping huge volumes of dead juvenile fish into the sea, something that hugely impacts our livelihood.” Despite the government intensifying surveillance methods to curb the practice, it is still rampant in many places, they add. “They conduct inspections on the shore but what we need is regular patrolling in the sea. They usually keep the net in different pieces, so it’s not easy for the officers to find any evidence. But once in the sea they join the pieces to make a very large net,” he says.
Apart from the fall in catch, the fishermen are worried over the regular rough sea warnings and the lack of sufficient security measures.
‘Unequipped’
They think the Fisheries Department is totally unequipped to face any emergency situation during monsoon despite their tall claims. “In all districts, they have rented a couple of fishing boats to use for rescue operations. If we call the control room and report an emergency, they will take hours to act. We have been hearing about marine ambulance for long, but now we know it was just one of their hollow promises,” says Iliyas, a fisherman.
They add that the government has also been ignoring their pleas for permission to venture up to 34 nautical miles instead of the current 12. “There is no catch in the coastal waters and if we breach the stipulated area we will be slapped with a penalty. We are not doing it for fun, we take that risk as the demarcated area yields no fish," says A. Andrews, Kollam district secretary of the federation.
