Marine resources in West Africa are in a perilous state. The regional fisheries organization responsible for conducting scientific stock assessments and recommending fisheries management measures in the region is the Fishery Committee for the Eastern Central Atlantic (CECAF). Despite being hampered by a serious lack of catch and effort data, CECAF's latest assessment (2005) has identified that almost all of the stocks targeted in the waters of Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Sierra Leone are overexploited (croakers, catfish, seabream, grunts, sole, cuttlefish) or fully exploited (shrimp, threadfin).
CECAF recommend a reduction in fishing effort, but unless the widespread pirate fishing in the region is perturbed, this will not be achievable. Illegal fishing by unlicensed vessels in West African waters has resulted in the fundamental problem of "overcapacity" - too many boats catching too few fish - which inevitably results in overexploitation. Furthermore, many boats, both licensed and unlicensed, employ fishing gears or practises that are highly damaging to the marine environment and which result in the deaths of many non-target species and juvenile fish. For example, common infractions in the region include the use of trawl nets with mesh of a smaller than permitted size, destructive bottom trawling, and fishing within the 12-mile coastal zone set aside exclusively for artisanal fishing, and which also contains vitally important spawning and nursery grounds of marine species. | ||||
The industrial trawlers that intrude into West Africa's coastal zone target cephalopods (octupuses, squid and cuttlefish), shrimp and demersal (bottom living) fish. In Guinea, for instance, the licensed demersal fish trawl fishery is estimated to discard 25% of its catch, the cephalopod fishery 27%, and the shrimp fishery 33%. Such levels of wastage in a country where over a quarter of the population are undernourished may seem abhorrent, but pirate trawlers operating in Guinean waters, and elsewhere in the region, undoubtedly have higher bycatch and discard rates as they use smaller mesh sizes and fish in shallow coastal waters.
Trawling also removes vast numbers of juvenile fish needed to sustain fish stocks and, by dragging heavy nets along the seabed, habitats that support marine life are damaged. One study has found that the pass of a single shrimp trawl can remove up to 25% of seabed life. In heavily trawled areas, habitats have little chance to recover and in some cases may be permanently damaged. Pirate fishing is a major contributor to overfishing in the West African region and is seriously undermining efforts by countries to sustainably manage their marine resources. Unless action is taken quickly to bring these pirate fleets under control, it is possible that we will witness the crash of one of the world's most productive marine fisheries, and with it, catastrophic impacts on local populations. | ||||
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