Greenpeace, an environmental group, has reported that Senegal’s fisheries ministry has given fishing licenses to vessels of a Chinese industrial fleet that was involved in illegitimate, not reported and unregulated fishing activity in recent years.
The report, ‘Seasick: As Covid-19 locks down West Africa, its waters remain open to plunder‘, is based on the NGO’s investigation of fishing vessels, fish meal and fish oil factories in Senegal, Mauritania and Gambia between March and July.
The report scrutinised the events that surrounded the unprecedented 52 foreign vessels that submitted application to acquire fishing licenses to the Senegalese government earlier in 2020 amid lockdown restrictions induced by the coronavirus pandemic. The applications provoked many Senegalese fisheries stakeholders which include artisanal fishermen, owners of industrial ships and civil society organizations.
Many foreign vessels have never applied for licenses like that before, especially during a time when of lockdown constraints and food insecurity. A Civil society group, APRAPAM, argued that if the licenses are granted, fishing pressure on Senegal’s waters will increase and that would threaten sustainability and the livelihoods of artisanal fishing communities that are suffering from the restrictions put in place to curb the pandemic.
As a result of the tension, the fisheries ministry was forced to publicly announce its rejection of the 52 applications in June but local media reports unveiled evidence that shows that the government surreptitiously issued a license to the Chinese vessel, Fu Yuan Yu 9889 on April 17. As a result of this, another vessels operator, Univers Peche, went to seek licenses for extra nine vessels.
Also, Greenpeace confirmed that the reports of local media showed two of those vessels from the Fu Yuan Yu fleet, Fu Yuan Yu 9885 and Fu Yuan Yu 9888, got licenses. Meanwhile, for local fisheries stakeholders, these licenses have also revealed Senegal’s shady licensing process.
While talking about the untransparent licensing process, Mor Mbengue, an activist and member of Platform of Artisanal Players of Senegal’s Fisheries said: “If the license process was transparent, no one would be asking whether the department had signed new licenses or not.” He added that “the artisanal fishing actors, who are the most impacted, are not always consulted by authorities when licenses are attributed even though they should be as representatives of the Committee of License Attribution.”
According to United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, about 90% of Senegal’s fisheries are either fully fished or facing collapse. This overfishing has brought about food crisis, which has been worsened by Asian and European fleets exploiting the seas of West Africa. Revenues from the artisanal sector have been recently hit by the closure of markets to halt coronavirus.
While reacting to the development, Tal Harris, Communications Coordinator for Greenpeace Africa said: “Unlike most other businesses, including the artisanal fishing activities, the multinational industrial fishing sector has in several cases continued operating without being restricted by the Covid-19 lock-down.
“The already problematic competition between the artisanal sector and large-scale foreign fishing industries is thus made even worse for the declining West African fish stocks.
“Some of these foreign companies have even made attempts to profit from the Covid-19 lockdown to continue their illegal practices, knowing that the attention of civil society and the majority of actors is being captured by the pandemic.”
