Durban - South Africa’s coastline, stretching almost 4 000km, is wide open to China’s fishing fleets that are accused of plundering dwindling fish stocks.
And the arrest a week ago of three Chinese fishing boats in East London, has raised the alarm that illegal fishing within South Africa’s territorial waters is being carried out by part of China’s 2 000-strong deep-water fishing fleet.
Experts are now calling for a co-ordinated approach to protect South Africa’s waters as the global demand for fish protein puts pressure on fish stocks.
A military expert believes a “visible presence” from the navy would act as a major deterrent.
Even with the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission in place, which sets out to protect migratory fish from over-fishing, illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing takes place, with the majority of violations committed by Chinese vessels, according to data on the IOTC website.
The AU is now pushing for all inter-country fishing agreements to be transparent, to avoid conflict.
A study by the European Parliament estimated that between 2000 and 2011 Chinese fishermen extracted 4.6 million tons of fish a year, the majority from African waters, followed by Asian waters, and smaller amounts from Central and South America, and Antarctica.
This week the Hawks took over the investigation of nine vessels spotted off the Eastern Cape. Three boats were arrested a week ago by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries.
Their presence within South Africa’s Exclusive Economic Zone was discovered by a KZN resident using a phone app, but efforts by the authorities to track them took days, and even then the department encountered resistance from the fleet.
The vessel, Lu Huang Yuan Yu 186, refused to comply with orders to allow boarding, and was forced to port in Cape Town by officials.
Last Sunday the navy’s SAS Drakensberg intercepted three other boats and ordered them into East London harbour. They are the Fu Yuan Yu 7880, Fu Yuang Yu 7881 and Run Da 617.
South Africa has charged the skippers with fishing in its waters with no permission, and evading the law. They face three charges of possessing fishing product and equipment without a permit, failing to obey an order from fisheries officers to stop their vessels, and possessing fishing gear in South Africa’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
Apart from naval sorties off the coast when there has been an incident or when summoned to vessels in distress, the country’s coastline is unprotected, according to sources.
The KZN coast, from Port Edward to Kosi Bay in the north, is protected by Ezemvelo through a contract with the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. This contract expires at the end of July when the duty returns to the department.
Ezemvelo spokesman Musa Mthambo said its vessels routinely pulled up illegal nets, but this was restricted to 20 nautical miles out to sea. He said the navy and department were supposed to respond to any eventuality further out.
Military expert Helmoed Romer-Heitman said the protection of territorial waters was “hopelessly inadequate” and needed to be overhauled.
“We have no surveillance craft and no back-up ships to do enforcement. The navy has four frigates, based in Simons-town. The three strike craft in Durban have the range and the power, but ideally we should have patrol vessels of 80 to 90m with space for a helicopter.
If you are trying to deter foreign fishing vessels from entering your waters, you need to be out there, which we are not,” he said.
Further, the SAAF no longer had the Shackletons and Albatross aircraft which once provided air support at sea, he said.
Tensions with other countries over China’s expanding presence on the sea have risen. Last month, Indonesia blew up a Chinese boat it said was fishing illegally in its waters.
Johann Augustyn of the South African Deep Sea Trawling Industry Association said: “If the threat is growing, we need more fisheries protection vessels and for the navy to play a bigger role, but it all depends on government funding.”
South Africa’s Ocean Economy is part of the National Development Plan and was given a major push by President Jacob Zuma in Parliament earlier this year.
He said it was a critical pillar of the nine-point plan to harness resources for the country.
This would see massive investment in transport and manufacturing, offshore oil and gas exploration, coastal and marine tourism, as well as marine protection and ocean governance.
Questions sent to the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries on the coast’s vulnerability were not answered by the time of going to press.
Sunday Tribune