The plight of the fishermen of Pulau Betong in Penang, who are struggling with depleting catch due to illegal trawlers, received a ray of hope this week when they managed to capture video evidence of a commercial boat operating in their waters.

 

fishing trawlers 231216 fish The video, captured on Aug 13, showed a commercial ‘B-grade’ fishing boat operating in close proximity to the Pulau Betong coastline, estimated to be within two-and-a-half nautical miles from the shore.

 

This constitutes a clear infringement of the Fisheries Act 1985 that deems commercial fishing within a five nautical mile radius from the shore illegal.

The Act only permits inshore fishing within the limit in order to protect the livelihood of local fishermen.

The Pulau Betong fishermen say trawlers started trespassing their fishing area since early this year.

Nine police reports filed

 

Nine police reports have already been filed against the trawlers, but the maritime police has allegedly not taken any action.

However, Pulau Betong fishermen’s representative Tan Ah Kee is optimistic that the new video evidence will prompt the police to finally take concrete action following his latest report at the Sungai Korok police station in Barat Daya.

 

pulau betong illegal fishing trawler He said he was about to participate at a press conference organised to raise awareness of the Pulau Betong fishermen’s plight when he received news from local fishermen of a commercial boat ( left ) fishing in their waters.

Around 500 inshore fishermen from the Barat Daya district had last week called for the Fisheries Act to be amended to increase their fishing area to 12 nautical miles to counter a drop of an alarming 70 percent in their income due to commercial fishing.

 

Video

Ghost trawler caught red-handed l 9.26 min