Mangaluru, Aug 1: The fishing activity has begun across coastal districts of Karnataka today as the 61-day fishing ban has ended.
As monsoon is the breeding season for fishes, the government had banned fishing between June 1 and July 31 under the Karnataka Coastal Fishing (Regulation) Act, 1986. The ban is to facilitate breeding of fishes in the sea. The fisheries harbour at Old Port in Mangaluru was buzzing with activities, as fishermen and labourers went around preparing nets and fishing boats.
Though the fishing season began today, not all the boats ventured into deep-sea fishing. “The Covid-19 pandemic, uncertainty in markets, fishermen failing to get their diesel passbook to avail subsidised diesel for boats and other factors will prevent full-scale fishing,” fishing leaders informed
There are 80 purse seine boats and 1,200 trawler boats in Dakshina Kannada district. Labourers from Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Jharkhand work in these boats that engage in deep sea fishing. "Many boat owners had not received their passbooks in order to avail subsidised diesel. Without the passbook, we can not avail diesel by paying the market price,” Mohan Bengre, a fisherman leader said.
A fishing boat requires 6,500 litres of diesel while going on deep sea expeditions. The fishermen get about 9,000 litres of subsidised diesel per month.
A few trawl boats will venture into the sea after offering prayers at Urwa Mariyamma Temple on August 6. Fishermen leaders, on the other hand, said they would go for deep sea fishing "after offering Samudra pooja on August 8.”
The inclement weather with cyclones and rise in price of diesel had affected fishing activities during the last fishing season. The fish catch during 2020-21 was 1,39,714.04 tonne worth Rs 1,924 crore, while in 2019-20, it was 1,79,944 tonne worth Rs 2,031 crore.
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