Decades later…99% of Guyana’s territorial waters still unprotected

Sep 07, 2022 News

…remain infested with lawless fishing practices – Int’l Report

Kaieteur News – An August 2022 report by the American University Center for Latin American & Latino Studies in collaboration with InSight Crime, a non-profit investigative journalism organisation, has placed the spotlight on Guyana’s lack of protection for 99 percent of its territorial waters.

As a result of not being able to properly patrol its waters, the report states that Guyana suffers from significant illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing practices, thereby impacting populations of finfish, red snapper, prawns, seabob, whitebelly and tuna.

It was keen to note that Guyana does not have the resources to fully patrol its waters, adding that Guyana has just nine vessels and 180 active sailors in its joint coast guard and navy. Kaieteur News understands that the Guyana Defence Force has four Barracuda patrol boats of which one vessel was undergoing repairs. GDF’s lone flagship patrol vessel “Essequibo” has been out of service in recent years and other patrol boats are unable to conduct long-range patrols. Importantly, Guyana had moved last year to acquire a brand new US$11.5M offshore patrol vessel from the USA which is scheduled to arrive this year.

Additionally, it was noted that a lack of data and poor data collection methods mean that there are few reliable national estimates of the number of vessels engaged in fishing, legally or otherwise. It was also stated that the licensing of domestic fishers is non-systematic.

To a considerable extent, the report says Guyana relies on private vessels to spot suspected illegal fishing and floating fish factories further offshore. Among the crimes noted by sources in Guyana it said, are poaching and piracy.

In 2018, the report highlighted that neighbouring Suriname had convicted nine Guyanese men for the murder of 12 rival fishers in Suriname’s waters, in an apparent dispute over fishing locales, sentencing them to imprisonment varying from five to 35 years.

Reference was also made to the legislative framework for Guyana and other Caribbean countries such as Jamaica, and Suriname. The report said these territories “tend to have the fewest and weakest laws regarding IUU fishing. None of the three countries have clearly established National Plans of Action (NPOAs) on fishing, the reported stated.

It was further noted that Guyana has made a stated commitment to protected areas with its Protected Areas Act, but according to the Marine Conservation Institute, less than one percent of its territorial waters is under any form of protection.

The Marine Conservation Institute estimates that Jamaica and Suriname fare only slightly better on this metric, protecting 1.2 and 1.6 percent, respectively, of their waters.
Importantly, the report states that the domestic legal infrastructure in the Caribbean countries is a developing effort. For example, in 2018, Guyana enacted new fisheries regulations on management and conservation, licensing of vessels, and fishing gear. That same year, Jamaica enacted Fisheries Act No. 18, governing the establishment of fishery institutions, fishery management areas, and licensing of vessels.

The document also states that the absence of a unified register of license permits is a significant impediment to monitoring, control and surveillance, and new legislation enforcing the creation of a register is pending. Suriname’s domestic legislation is the oldest of the three countries, as its key governing document (the Fish Inspection Act of 2000, governing the production, import, and export of fishery products in Suriname) is more than two decades old.

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