Long-lasting limbo

The deep-sea fishing sector has been in limbo ever since the licences of foreign vessels were withdrawn in the mid-1990s, following protests from local fishing communities that the trawlers were poaching on their turf. As a consequence of the decade-old ban, the fisheries potential of the country's vast exclusive economic zone (EEZ), beyond the depth of 50 metres, has gone abegging. That fishing vessels of neighbouring countries often encroach on India's EEZ to tap a part of the unexploited resource is what makes a review of the decade-old stand-off all the more necessary. According to the latest official reckoning, the fisheries potential of this region is around 0.8 million tonnes; others place the figure far higher. But precise mathematics is not the issue; what is important to focus on is the fact that deep-sea fishing can yield a rich catch, including tuna, carangid, ribbon fish, perch and the like. Most of these species have little demand at home but substantial potential for value-addition and export. As such, this is a sector that has the capacity to increase the country's share of the world trade in marine products, without affecting the existing demand-supply balance in the domestic market. What is more, it will diversify the marine export basket, which, at present, is confined chiefly to shrimps.

Indeed, going deeper into the oceans for fishing has, in a sense, become necessary now as the fisheries resources of the coastal and the near-shore deeper zones are already being over-exploited, requiring imposition of a fishing ban during the fish breeding season to allow re-building of the stocks. As a consequence, marine fish production has tended to stagnate of late. Whatever growth in fish output there is, is now coming largely from the inland fisheries sector. This apart, the excessive fishing in this zone has begun to cause biological and environmental degradation of these waters. Pollution from industrial and agricultural sources is further constraining the sustainability of coastal fisheries.

It is, therefore, to be welcomed that the government is at long last considering whether to restore deep sea fishing, by allowing Indian entrepreneurs to acquire fish-resource specific vessels for operating in the EEZ. However, the adherence to resource-specificity may pose some practical problems for fishing ventures; if this rider is meant to serve as a measure to prevent over-exploitation of any particular species, it may be worth trying out but there will be a loss of operational flexibility as a result. Meanwhile, continuing with the ban on the chartering of foreign vessels does not seem justified. The government, it is obvious, is averse to taking any action that might provoke the traditional fishing communities all along the coastline, prone as they are to agitating when things go wrong. What is required is proper policing of the coastal waters, and stiff penal action if deep-sea trawlers encroach into coastal waters.

Many of these ideas have been discussed for several years, but the government has been slow in making a move; while caution is understandable, prolonged delay in decision-making is not. Some of the measures proposed now were mooted by the deep sea fishing policy review committee in the 1990s, and later incorporated in the comprehensive marine fishing policy of 2004. What is needed now is to speed up action because it takes time for deep-sea fishing to get going after all the clearances have been given. Entrepreneurs will require time to come up with bankable projects as external finance is required for inherently capital- and technology-intensive activity. Time is also needed for suitably strengthening the post-harvest infrastructure that is required to support this sector. Unless all this is done, it will be futile to expect the proposed policy changes to show results.