Latest update January 30th, 2025 6:10 AM
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No licences granted yet to Chinese, others for deep sea fishing
Authorities are moving to have vessels equipped with GPS trackers to help protect the country’s fishing grounds.
Government has received a number of applications for deep sea fishing from large-scale foreign operators, but has not yet granted any licences.
Responding to questions Monday during an appearance before a Parliamentary oversight committee on Natural Resources, Agriculture Minister Dr. Leslie Ramsammy said that there has been interest from boat companies in the Caribbean, North American and China.
Member of Parliament of A Partnership for National Unity (APNU), Joseph Harmon, was specifically interested in whether there were policies regarding the so-called large “factory ships”.
According to the Minister, Government has not closed the doors on licences for these large fishing vessels, but any such decision will have to come with conditions and intense monitoring.
These include no permission for the lucrative sea bobs and prawns, with the applicant tied down to fishing for only specific species of sea food, including tuna.
Studies will have to be conducted to determine the fish stock and only then will any applications be considered, the Minister stressed.
There have been concerns that the operations by the “factory ships” could cause severe harm in Guyana’s offshore fishing waters. Already, several studies have indicated that overfishing have created problems.
In recent years, as it became clear that fishermen were seeing their hauls reducing in size and specific species, Government had moved to reduce the number of fishing trawlers that were licenced. Last year, only 87 licences were issued, a reduction to the 120 from the previous year.
It is estimated that Guyana has between 1,200-1,300 artisanal fishing vessels, with many of them not being licenced.
One of the measures actively being worked on by Government is the requirement for all fishing vessels to be equipped with monitoring systems. The GPS systems allow the Ministries to monitor the locations of the vessels at any given time and could also be used for security purposes – like in a case of a pirate attack.
For 2013, 20 units were installed on sea bob trawlers. Some 110 are yet to be installed.
The Ministry is now also working to source cheaper monitoring systems with a number of trawlers to be equipped by this year end. These have been moves over recent years, but fishermen have been slow in buying the equipment, saying that it was too expensive.
Guyana will also be moving to introduce what is known as the turtle excluder devices, a requirement if the country intends to market to North America and Europe.
Last year, 385 artisanal vessels were licenced representing 30% of the projected target. This represented a reduction of 75 vessels or 17% less artisanal vessels licences issued than in 2012.
Last year, Government hauled in $125M in taxes from fish imports and exports. Seven hundred and forty nine (749) individual export licences were issued representing 62% of the twelve hundred (1200) target.
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