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British Government Neglects Falklands Fishing Opportunities By Major
Ronnie N. Spafford British Government Neglect of Falkland Fishing Opportunities The following article was published in 'World Fishing' on 14th October 1984. We have reason to believe that none of the facts which it contains are known to those whose responsibility it is to advise the British Government. It is likely to rouse far more interest in the foreign countries, in particular the Eastern block countries, than those Departments of Her Majesty's Government whose task it is to assist in the development of the economy of the Falkland Islands and to keep Ministers and the public informed of the commercial advantages to Britain to be obtained from developing the resources of the Islands. An
Economic Fishing Zone His enquiries have taken him to one of the best known and most successful of the British trawler owners and international fish merchants, J. Marr & Sons Ltd. Six of J. Marr & Sons' trawlers accompanied the Task Force with naval crews as minesweepers and escort vessels. After the liberation the next that Mr. Marr heard of his trawlers was a telephone call from the Ministry of Defence saying that his ships were in Gibraltar and what did he want done with them. It is a great pity that the Navy did not keep them in the Falkland Islands because Mr. Marr with a little encouragement would have no doubt been happy to see them equipped to work in the seas surrounding the Islands, an area in which he and other trawler owners have always been interested. Perhaps one of them could have become a fishery protection vessel guarding the 200 mile Economic Fishing Zone, which ought long since to have been declared round the Islands. But this is not the British way. Civil servants do not work closely enough with industry and commerce, the Armed Forces have no modern tradition of assisting in the development of remote areas, the Treasury is not prepared to move fast enough to take advantage of opportunities as they arise to benefit Britain. We are assured by the Falkland Islands Department of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office that every possible effort is being made by Her Majesty's Government to lead to the declaration of a 200 mile EXCLUSIVE FISHING ZONE, but no reason for the failure to declare one has yet been given. The fact is that the word 'bonanza' is being used by practical fishermen from three continents about the fishery products within the 200 mile Exclusive Fishing Zone. As Simon Lister of the Falkland Islands Foundation has pointed out, control is essential in the interests of conservation. Meanwhile fortunes are being made at the expense of the long term benefit of the Falkland Islands and Britain in the absence of well managed sea fishery. A Fishing Industry Going To Waste Perhaps one of the most remarkable and costly failure of the British Government is their omission to have declared a 200-mile fishing limit around the Falkland Islands and their Dependencies. Their failure to do so is almost certainly costing the Falkland Islanders a healthy income of larger proportions than that gained from sheep farming, the Islands staple economy. Further, because there is still only, at present, a British claim to a three-mile territorial sea around the islands, at least six foreign nations have been for some years, and still are now, overfishing as hard as they can before any restrictions or control are imposed. The situation is remarkable because everyone with any interest in the area has been telling successive British Governments about this situation for some years, and yet the British Government remains tight lipped and apparently inactive. Squid The White Fish Authority Report of 1979 ('Fisheries Opportunities in the South West Atlantic' published by the White Fish Authority Industrial Development Unit, ODA, 1979) estimated the annual fishing potential around the Falkland Islands and Dependencies at £108 million. However this was for fin fish only, and all thoughts had been directed towards the potential of Notothenia rossii (Antarctic cod), Merluccius hubbsii (Patagonian hake) and Micromesistius anustalis (Blue whiting), the latter being so heavily parasitised that it was unsuitable for marketing except as fish meal. One benefit of the 1982 Falkland Islands War was the discovery by a Polish fishing fleet, driven from their familiar fishing grounds around the Falklands, of large stocks of squid off South Georgia. No one had previously considered fishing for squid and no investigation had been made. Two types of squid are found off the Falkland Islands and Dependencies: lolligo patagonia and illecabbrosus. This is a highly desirable commodity in certain countries, currently selling at around £400 per ton. The chief markets for squid are in Europe for 100,000 tons/year (Spain 40,000 tons, Italy 30,000 tons) and in the Far East, principally Japan. On 31st July, whilst I was visiting a fishing company in Hull, I was told that they had, that day, purchased from the Russians 25,000 tons of Falklands squid tube, which is about 50% of the squid, representing some £10 million. They said that this was not abnormal. J. Marr and Sons Ltd., who trade in fish on a world-wide commodity basis, exchanging bulk fish stocks between countries, and who are constantly monitoring the world market, conservatively estimated that the annual squid potential within 200 miles of the Falkland Islands and Dependencies at 250,000 tons a year, or some £100 million. If this is true, this now dramatically doubles the fishing potential around the Falkland Islands and Dependencies from £108 million to a conservative figure of £200 million per year, and makes for a financial operation which it would be scandalous for the British Government to allow the Falkland Islanders to miss. Fishing Policy The Falkland Islanders themselves are already fully employed with the sheep farming industry, have no traditional interest in fishing, have no desire to catch any fish themselves, neither do they eat a great deal of fish. British fishing fleets are not organised to catch fish 8,000 miles from home, nor, it seems, with recently increased costs and present wage levels would it be economic for ships with British crews to do so. However, the fishing fleets of such countries as Russia, Poland, East Germany, Spain, Japan and Taiwan are organised for a distant operation with crews spending exceptionally long periods at sea, and, because of lower wage levels, they still find it economic. Furthermore they are actually doing it now successfully and as hard as they can. Indeed, Simon Lister, Secretary of a conservation society, the Falkland Islands Foundation, has produced statistics to show that over-fishing by these foreign fleets around South Georgia since 1969 are already, and increasingly, seriously depleting fin fish stocks there. These have been made from assessments of catches by type of fin fish over successive years and show a marked decline, though equally it could be argued that this is because of a change to squid fishing. However, in a letter to The Times, published on 29th June this year, he reported a conversation he had with a Polish skipper in January "who thought we had completely lost our senses but was determined to profit from the bonanza while it lasts". Just a glance at the revenue from harbour dues received from foreign trawlers by the Harbour Master at Port Stanley over successive years reveals the escalating fishing interest.
Current thought is that the Falklands fishing industry should be based on licensing these foreign countries, and indeed any other ones such as Chile or even Argentina, to catch fish within a 200-mile limit at a rate and in such quantity only, that the fish stocks are adequately conserved, and the industry preserved in a viable economic form for the foreseeable future. This makes sense not only for the future of the Falkland Islanders, but also for the future prospects of the fishing fleets themselves. Surveillance, Policing and Research Clearly the first step in organising the Falkland Islands fishing industry is to declare a 200-mile limit. The next stage is to employ a system of Surveillance and Policing. Although some testing of fish stocks in the area have been usefully carried out over the lat ten years, no really detailed research over a period has been carried out using a proper research vessel, and no one has yet researched at all into Falkland squid, which has now assumed such importance. It would take time and a vessel employed solely on this task would be expensive. J. Marr and Sons, who now own and are presenting refitting the Fish Research Vessel G.A. Reay, confidently believe that the necessary surveillance and control could be exercised by such a vessel at the same time as she was used to carry out detailed research over a continuing period, operating together with a particular mark of Dornier aeroplane that they have in mind. This vessel has the capability of sailing to the Falklands without refuelling, and would carry on board a complete module for the maintenance and repair of the plane, as well as all the long term spares needed and a special workshop facility. Thus they see the boat and the plane as a complete team both for operation and maintenance. The G.A. Reay, gross tonnage 998.92, built in 1968, is an Ice Class 3 Research Vessel, fitted out with adequate dry and wet laboratories and with very comprehensive navigation and detection equipment. She has a service speed of 14.5 knots and an endurance of over 40 days. The G.A. Reay, previously operated by the Torry Research Station of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, was mentioned in Lord Shackleton's Falkland Islands Economic Study of 1982, as being a vessel of suitable size and suitably equipped for such a task. J. Marr and Sons say that the G.A. Reay, or a similar vessel, could be adequately fitted out to operate around the Falkland Islands and Dependencies at a cost of less than £5,000 per day, or under £2 million a year. The plane would cost a further £1 million a year, making the total cost for Surveillance, Policing and Research of £3 million a year. Licensing and Penalties The precise license fees would have to be calculated on the Total Allowable Catch, and this cannot be accurately determined until more detailed and extensive research has been carried out. J. Marr and Sons suggest a license fee of 5%, paid in advance, which, if their conservatively estimated annual Total Allowable Catch of £200 million per year proves to be correct, would produce a revenue to the Falkland Islands of £10 million, which makes the industry very profitable. The Russians and Poles, lacking Western currency, like to pay their license fees in fish, and, if such a firm as Marr were controlling the operation for the Falkland Islands Government, there would be no problem: Marr would sell the fish within their normal business operation and hand over the cash to the Falkland Islands Treasury. Licensing regulations could also include other conditions; for example if there was a requirement for fish meal as a fertiliser to improve the soil of the Islands, then a condition could be made that the first licenses would be issued to those vessels carrying on board a fish meal plant. Once a licensing system has been established, there may be all sorts of other side benefits to the Islands which could be made conditional. It would be desirable to include other penalties as well as fines in a case of regulation infringements. The withdrawal of a license, even for a temporary period, is a very serious penalty for a Russian or Polish ship, for this means the recall of the vessel to the Eastern Block, and the skipper would almost certainly never appear in the area again. Simple Economics Assuming that J. Marr and Sons estimates are correct, the simple economics of the fishing industry are as follows:
It is relevant to note that the present income to the Colony from sheep farming is £3.5 million per year, and the addition of £7 million would mean that so many of the desired projects in developing the Islands could be achieved out of the Falkland Islanders own pockets. Furthermore there could be all sorts of other side benefits to the Falkland Islands. Examples might be:
Urgent Action Required It is hard to understand why the British Government have been so dilatory over a declaration of a 200-mile fishing limit, and one can only surmise that they had been holding it as some sort of trump card in possible negotiations with Argentina. The latest attempt at talks have now failed with little prospect of any further attempt being made for some years to come, so it would seem that any obstacle has now finally been removed. Certainly not to have declared the limit two years after fighting a costly war to regain the Islands, must make other nations wonder if Britain now doubts its sovereignty claim. But until a 200-mile limit has been declared, all other efforts towards establishing a fishing industry are pointless. Meanwhile we have to sit back and watch, while countries of the Eastern Block take freely that which rightly belongs to the Falkland Islanders, and then sell it back to the West. Perhaps the Polish skipper was correct and the British Government has taken leave of its senses, for unless action is taken urgently, the rape of the Falklands seas will continue, and, very soon, there will be no fish left to catch, and a profitable industry will have been lost. This
article appeared in the Falkland Islands Newsletter, Edition 36,
September 1988. The Falkland Islands Association is an independent
organisation which brings together those who support the continuing
freedom of the people of the Falkland Islands. Its Constitution
states that its objectives are to assist the people of the Falkland
Islands to decide their own future for themselves without being subjected
to pressure direct or indirect from any quarter. |
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