Fishing boats to go into deep sea from today

With the 61-day ban on deep-sea fishing ending, trawl and purse seine boats will venture out starting Thursday.

The Department of Fisheries had banned fishing along the coast from June 1 to July 31 – which was declared as a breeding period for fish. Unlike in the past, fishermen will have to adhere to new norms this fishing season.

“As ordered by the government on June 29, 2019, the Fisheries Department officials had directed the fishermen venturing into the deep sea to carry nets of minimum 19 sizes to prevent the younger fish from getting caught along with the older ones,” Tippeswamy, district deputy director of the Fisheries Department pointed out.

He reminded that the death of juvenile fish in large numbers will result in a decrease in the fish population.

AIS transponders

“Keeping in mind the safety of fishermen too, installation of AIS transponders with in-built GPS was made mandatory for fishing boats from this season,” he added.

Nithin Kumar, president of the Mangalore Trawl Boat Fishermen’s Association, said that around 50 steel trawl boats will venture into the deep sea on August 1, as there is a shortage of space along the estuary to line up boats in a single stretch.

“Each boat will be equipped with nets, ice, diesel and ration lasting a period of 10 days. These boats are speed boats,” he said and added, “An additional 850 deep-sea trawlers will venture into the sea within the next fortnight. Around 1,150 trawl boats will be fishing during this season.”

200 purse seine boats

Mohan Bengre, president of the Mangaluru Purse Seine Boat Fishermen Association, said that around fishermen on 200 purse seine boats will begin their deep-sea fishing from August 1.

Manjulashree Shenoy, Fisheries Department district assistant director, said that there are 1,326 registered trawl and purse seine boats on the Mangaluru coast.

“These apart, there were 1,483 country boats. Up to 954 boats were declared eligible for subsidies, in terms of sales tax exemption,” the assistant director added.