Karachi Fish Harbour Authority (KHFA) has decided to ban the landing of trash fish at harbour from August 1, to protect the fish and shrimp species from extinction, officials said on Thursday.
The authority will also impose huge fines on the violators as it has already decided to disallow using of prohibited cod-end nets on the Arabian Sea, asking Fishermen Co-operative Society (FCS) to start inspections of berthed boats at harbour from August 1, they said.
Fisheries stakeholders had already agreed to undertake a third round of fishing net test before finalizing the mesh size to discard the use of existing lethal cod-end meshes, which have left the marine species badly affected.
Officials said Managing Director of KFHA, Abdul Ghani Jokhio had informed the stakeholders about the authority's fishing restriction and future plans, asking them to follow the rules for a better catch and harbour security. "MD has held a meeting with stakeholders and he informed them about the new policy on trash fish landing," they said. The warning is aimed at bringing the fishermen's key focus on the legal way of fishing and asking them to avoid trapping of undersized fish.
According to an estimate of fisheries sector, a truck transports at least 14,000 tons to 18,000 tons of trash fish (undersized fish) on a daily basis from Karachi fish harbour to different factories for making poultry feed out them. "About 50 to 70 such trucks carry the trash every day," source said.
Officials said the rising trend in the trash fish landing had encouraged the fishermen to carrying out hunting of marine species without any checks as Arabian seawater began losing its fish and shrimp resources gradually for lack of their protection. "The authority has to put a bar on such illegal and anti-marine exploitation by the fishermen on the sea and steps will be taken to discourage the illegal hunting modes to allow the marine species to reach their nature growth," they said.
They said the illegal nets were primarily responsible for the catch of trash fish and shrimp species, as the Sindh government also planned to ban the use of such nets with strict laws," they said.
The government has decided to carry out a final round of net test exercise by this week to set the fishing net size for local fishermen of the province, particularly those of Karachi fish harbour and Ibrahim Haideri, officials said.
The stakeholders particularly the boat owners emphasized on undertaking the final round of the trial with increased mesh size as with a view to give maximum space to juvenile fish and shrimp species to escape the trap, they said.
The experts will also focus on the nets' tail-cod size because it is seen severely lethal to trapping the juvenile marine species including fish, shrimp, crabs and other unwanted sea creatures as by catch. "The 3-4 meter long tail-cod size of fishing nets is causing damage to the marine life for it has no escape-roots to allow the undersize species to flee," they said.
Catch of undersized fish and shrimp species by local fishermen had grown excessively in the last several years, as the practice continued unchecked by the concerned fisheries departments of the government, they said.
"The phenomenal decline in landing of matured fish and shrimp species eventually made the concerned government's authorities step up against the use of illegal nets and have the stakeholders agreed to introduce a better option to save the undersized species from early perishing," said officials.
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