"It is high time for social security funds to divert their investments in this important sector in the country," Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, Dr Charles Tizeba, said.

 

He said that the government has been struggling to improve the fishing industry by encouraging investors to engage themselves in deep sea fishing to raise the national income.

 

He said since financial institutions are not ready to support the industry, the government has been compelled to engaged social security funds to put up projects to boost the fishing industry.

 

Currently, the sector faces various challenges that range from lack of modern equipment, skills and training, among others.

 

The meeting was also attended by Zanzibar Minister for Agriculture, Hamad Rashid Mohamed and representatives of Public Service Pensions Fund and the National Social Security Fund (NSSF).

 

Hamad said there is poor administration in deep sea fishing in which more than 105 licensed foreign fishing vessels which have been discarding bycatch at sea against the set conditions of the licence.

 

In fishing terminology, bycatch, is a fish or other marine species that is caught unintentionally while catching certain target species and target sizes of fish and crabs. Bycatch is either of a different species, the wrong sex or is undersized or juvenile individuals of the target species.

 

"We have witnessed malpractices in this sector simply because there are few local people in the sector as they have insufficient funds to invest in fishing," he noted. Hamad said benefits from deep sea fishing were negligible compared to the reality that the country has potential for vast fish population

Source : allafrica.com