Sunday, August 08, 2004 New agriculture head steps up fishery code enforcement
THE new officer-in-charge of the City Agriculture Office (CAO) has stepped up the Implementation of the new City Fishery Ordinance 1768 - 2003 to protect the rivers from abusive fishing operators and ensure quality of marine production.
Molina, a former official of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources-Department of Agriculture (BFAR-DA) in the Ilocos Region based in San Fernando City, La Union, replaced Alberto de Vera.
Prior to Molina's take over of the CAO, De Vera had started clearing the navigational paths in more than 200 hectares of inland waters to assure convenience in water transportation services and at the same time maximize aqua-culture productivity in the city.
CAO-OIC Emma G. Molina noted that they have intensified the registration for the Registry of Fisherfolks in preparation for the awarding Aquaculture Lease Agreement (ALA).
Some 800 fisherfolks had already registered, a CAO staff said. The ALA will be the permit for the fisherfolks to use the city's rivers for fishing operations.
Parallel to this effort, Molina said that they have established the navigational lane and set up bouys around it. "If your structure is within the buoys, that is an indicative sign that your fishing structure will be dismantled," Molina said.
She said that the operator has only two choices: to dismantle his structure or pay the city government to conduct the dismantling of his fishing apparatus.
Molina said that the grant of ALA should be limited to one permit/license per qualified head of the family who must be a bona fide resident of Dagupan City.
According to the fishery ordinance, each license is equivalent to one unit of fishpen, fish cage occupying a maximum area of 300 sq.m. or 10 meters x 30 meters.
"We have finalized the aquaculture map showing specific areas where fishing apparatus can be set up in the fishery zones," Molina said, adding that the indiscriminate installation is no longer allowed.
She said that the CAO and the FMS, is targeting only 1,000 ALA holders to regulate fishing operators within the city's river system.
Since fishing apparatus surfaced in the city's rivers in the early 90's, no serious regulations had been implemented and no fees were charged to operators. " There were operators who had fish pens here but they were non-Dagupeño," a CAO staff said.
She said that the amount would be used for the development, protection, and conservation to ensure sustainability of the rivers and pave the way for optimum production of marine resources.
"In our initial survey, there are already 500 units of fishing apparatus within the navigational lanes," Molina said. She added that the operators of these structures have already received notice to dismantle from the city government.
"Our team is ready to renew a full-scale dismantling of illegal fishpens. This time we will do it systematically and we will not allow illegal structures to resurface again," Molina, a former BFAR executive, emphatically said.
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