Faulty Fishing Agreement Costs Nigeria, Gulf of Guinea Countries $2billion Annually

By ZION Olalekan |

The Gulf of Guinea Commission (GGC) has said that Nigeria as well as other Western African countries along the Gulf of Guinea (GOG) are losing a whopping $2billion due to faulty fishing agreements signed with foreigners.

Speaking in Lagos yesterday at the opening ceremony of the Gulf of Guinea Conference tagged: “Blue Economy in the Interest of Food Security”, Executive Secretary of the Commission, Amb. Florentine Ukonga lamented that while other countries and regions are reaping the benefits and returns from the blue economy, West Africa is estimated to be losing about $2 billion annually from illegal fishing, even as she added that its coastal sector remains largely underdeveloped and poorly governed.

She said that this has enabled other forces from outside the continent to benefit more from the potentials of the region than its citizens.

She blamed that theft of marine resources is due to faulty fishing agreements, saying that most West African countries do not have a means of determining what is being carted away by foreigners.

In terms of insecurity in the GOG region, she lamented that government of member states of the region are sea blind.

She said governments are concentrating Security measures and Services on the land, while neglecting the maritime domain.

According to her, this has made the maritime domain of the GOG a safe haven for illegal activities of arms trafficking, illegal immigration, human trafficking, and drugs trafficking among other types of trafficking.

She subsequently called for cooperation among member States by pulling resources together and fight piracy. She said Nigerian Navy is working hard to curtail incidences of piracy, but they should work in collaboration with other navies of other states of the region.

She listed members of GOG commission to include Nigeria, Cameroon, Republic of Gabon, Congo, Sao Tome and Principe, Congo DR, Ghana and Angola.

Amb Ukonga noted that fishing is one of the ways by which the West African Region can take full advantage of the vast ocean resources of the region and improve the standard of living of its population.

“This can be developed to the level that no importation of frozen marine living resources from outside the GOG region will be necessary for consumption, if our living marine resources are properly harnessed, developed, grown and controlled.

“According to FAO estimates, approximately 57 percent of fish stocks are fully exploited and another 30 percent are overexploited, depleted or recovering. Fish stocks are also further exploited by illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, which is estimated to be 26 million tonnes of fish catches annually, or US$10 to 22 billion in unlawful or undocumented revenue.

“There is strong evidence that major ocean assets have been in steady decline for many years, many of the living marine resources are in serious decline as a result of human activities at seas, and there have not been any serious sustainable practices to deal with this serious threat in this part of the world.

“The Blue Economy is already faltering and not delivering anything like its full potential, at a time when the population is on the increase and the need for food and resources from the ocean is also increasing”.

Amb Ukonga said that the exploitation of hydrocarbons has brought pollution to the GOG environment, killing off the living marine resources, thus depriving the communities of their age-long profession of being good fishermen.

While declaring the 3-Day conference open, Director General of Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) Dr. Dakuku Peterside noted that the conference which is the 2nd edition is targeted at bringing together experts from the region in order to brainstorm on how to harness the enormous resources in the blue economy instead of concentrating on the crude oil.

Peterside who was represented by the Executive Director Finance and Administration, Mr. Bashir Jamoh stressed the need for Nigeria as a country to look beyond crude oil.

“You would agree with me that the developing countries who are patronizing our own oil are working day and night to see an alternative source of earning instead of concentrating on crude oil.

“Countries within the sub region who never had crude oil are today having crude oil, these countries include Ghana, Niger Republic and Republic of Benin are all detecting oil.

“It is time for us to track what other resources, this can be done through high scale research. For those of us that understand the issues of fishing, shrimps and other resources across the shorelines, we would be able to conduct the search on how these resources can be harnessed as a viable replacement to crude oil”, Peterside stated.