Luanda - The member states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), including Angola, lose around 23.5 billion US dollars (1 dollar is worth 828 kwanzas) a year due to illegal, undeclared and unregulated fishing.
According to the SADC Regional Centre for the Coordination of Monitoring, Control and Inspection of Fisheries, despite the fact that these figures have been calculated, the real economic losses from fishing are still difficult to estimate.
Faced with this scenario, Angola, through the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, is attentive and involved in the effort to combat this evil, using new technologies from the Southern Region Monitoring Centre.
In this area, on the 20th of this month, Angola, in partnership with the Embassy of the United States of America, hosted the initial meeting of the Atlantic SADC project, which aimed to improve the quality of visualisation of offenders.
In turn, the Minister for Fisheries and Marine Resources, Carmen dos Santos, reaffirmed the Angolan government's commitment to maintaining sustainable management of the oceans, reinforcing the fight against illegal fishing.
According to the minister, with the use of new technologies from the Regional Centre, it will be possible to see specifically where the offence is being committed, in real time.
The Regional Centre points out that illegal operators are driven by money, and the main concentration points for their operations are the Indian and Atlantic oceans, which border southern Africa.
It also considers the effects of illegal fishing to be serious, particularly for coastal states facing various development challenges, as well as accelerating the overexploitation of natural fishing resources.
Large-scale illegal fishing activity is often systematic, organised and transactional, and is associated with other criminal activities, such as tax evasion, money laundering, drug trafficking and human trafficking, among other crimes.
To stop this practice, the SADC institution calls for immediate action to protect the health of the oceans, biodiversity and fish stocks, as well as to ensure that fisheries continue to provide food and nutrition, livelihoods and financial benefits to the region's citizens. ML/QCB/DAN/DOJ
