Agriculture Ministry opens study on declining fish catch

Dec 06, 2021 News

Kaieteur News – Reports of fish shortage on the local markets and a decline in catch by fishermen have triggered a study by the Ministry of Agriculture.
In an interview with Kaieteur News, the Agriculture Minister, Zulfikar Mustapha confirmed that work has commenced in this regard. According to the minister, a local committee has been established to investigate the situation.

Minister of Agriculture, Zulfikar Mustapha

In fact, this publication was told that a meeting will be held today (Monday) to discuss the way forward. During a meeting with fishermen on November 24, 2021, the Minister acknowledged that there is indeed a shortage of fish. It was there he made the commitment to undertake a study to get a true understanding of the situation.
Mustapha told the fishers that the reason behind low catches in one country may not be the reasons behind low catches in another. He said a number of factors can be causing the low catches and, as a government, “we are prepared to work with you to do the work so that we can have a solution to this issue,” Minister Mustapha said.
He informed the fishermen that the government has since engaged the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to assist with conducting an analysis to determine the reason behind the low catches. This newspaper recently reported that fishermen in Guyana are complaining of a rapid decline in catch, and are predicting that they may very well be out of jobs in the next five years, even as they attributed this to ExxonMobil’s operations offshore.
“Ever since them man start drill we seabed out deh we catch gone very low. I in this business like since I was a child. In the earlies, from like 2007 when I start catch fish to like 2016. We used to get an exciting catch. But you see from like 2016 to now; presently, we catch is like going and strain water cause when we go out there we would just catch back lil gas money and something to feed the family. You can’t presently do nothing for yourself with this fish,” Stayon Frank, a fisherman who retails fish in the Stabroek Market told Kaieteur News.
While this may be the case, ExxonMobil is only now scrambling baseline data to understand the impacts of their operations offshore Guyana.
This was highlighted by Environmentalist, Simone Mangal-Joly during the online Consultations held by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Exxon Mobil’s Yellowtail Project.
She said, “It has no comprehensive mapping of the fish nurseries in Guyana or neighbouring countries that might be feeding our fisheries sector. There are no indications whatsoever in any baseline studies done, including the Marine Baseline Study of what the migratory patterns are of commercial or non-commercial fish compared to that whole zone”.
Responding to her concerns during the Consultative session was Environmental Resources Management (ERM) representative Jason Wiley.
According to him, the company did compile a report based on the details provided by a few persons in the various Administrative Regions; however, he assured that the study remains ongoing.
The Environmentalist however argued, “A baseline is something you collect before you attempt to do a project or an action that alters the conditions, such that if you were to come later you would then be able to know how the conditions have changed…you can’t be continuously collecting a baseline when there are already activities going on offshore that are affecting those conditions.”

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