Senegal: "If fish is not there, we will not be able to fish, even if they gave us gold canoes"

Gaoussou Gueye, president of the Association for the Promotion and Empowerment of Maritime Fisheries (APRAPAM), outlines the key issues missing from the agenda for the Presidential Fisheries Council in late May

In Senegal, a Presidential Council should be dedicated to the fisheries sector at the end of this month. This news was announced by President Macky Sall during the Council of Ministers on 31 March. In his speech, the President of the Republic indicated in particular "the urgent need to consolidate the programme to provide fishermen with subsidised life jackets, to accelerate the renewal of the fleet of motorised pirogues (subsidizing outboard motors) with the extension of the acquisition of fibreglass boats, and to extend the pirogue geolocation programme". He also invited the Minister of Fisheries and Maritime Economy "to pursue the intensive development of the aquaculture sub-sector, one of the growth engines retained in the implementation of the PSE [Emerging Senegal Plan, ed.]".

The actors of the artisanal fisheries sector, while welcoming the presidential initiative, nonetheless point out that certain basic issues are missing from the proposed agenda. For the Association for the Promotion and Empowerment of Artisanal Maritime Fishing Actors, APRAPAM, "the state of exploitation of the resource and transparency in the management of the sector are issues that should be put at the centre of the next Presidential Council on fisheries".

Gaoussou Gueye, president of APRAPAM, insists: "They talk to us about subsidies for outboard motors, fibreglass pirogues... But in the meantime, our fishermen are forced to leave for other countries in the region in search of fish because our waters are depleting. If fish is not there, we will not be able to fish, even if they gave us gold canoes”.

The agenda of the Presidential Council on the fisheries sector omits the vital issues of the state of the resource and transparency in the fisheries sector. Photo: The artisanal fishing landing site in Mbour/Facebook CAOPA.

Making safety at sea a priority, as proposed by the President, is an important positive signal for Gaoussou Gueye, especially as Senegal has ratified ILO Convention 188 on work in the fishing industry, which came into force in Senegal on 21 September 2019. However, what was mentioned during the Council of Ministers seems insufficient to him: "We have 22,000 pirogues in Senegal, and the authorities are proposing to provide the sector with 20,000 life jackets. How will they be distributed? One lifejacket per pirogue, when some pirogues carry up to 30, sometimes 40 people on board?", he wonders, while pointing out that other actors in the sector also need these to ensure their safety, such as the women who collect shellfish in coastal regions like Joal Fadiouth.

NATIONAL COMPANIES WITH FOREIGN CAPITAL: MORE TRANSPARENCY IS NEEDED

Transparency is also a key issue that should be on the agenda of the Presidential Council on Fisheries at the end of May. Gaoussou Gueye recalls that President Macky Sall had committed, in February 2016, that Senegal would join the Fisheries Transparency Initiative (FiTI). APRAPAM had seized the opportunity and, in May 2016, had proposed a roadmap to establish transparency in Senegal's fisheries, calling in particular for the texts of all fisheries agreements, the list of fishing licences in Senegal, a complete audit of the Senegalese flag, and the authorisations of processing factories, particularly those producing fish meal, to be made public. APRAPAM also insisted on the need to set up a system for collecting reliable data on catches, employment, etc. as a basis for sustainable fisheries management.

"Today, five years after Senegal's commitment to join the FiTI, nothing has progressed. The opacity surrounding the issuing of licences or the setting up of Senegalese companies with foreign capital remains unresolved," insists Gaoussou Gueye. "What we are experiencing in Senegal with these companies is happening all over Africa, in Madagascar, Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana and Mauritania. With my colleagues from CAOPA [Confédération africaine d'organisations professionnelles de la pêche artisanale, ed.], we have carried out several awareness-raising actions on the issue”.

CAOPA's demands are clear: "We want full transparency on how these foreign-owned national fishing companies are set up and how they operate; we want them not to compete with local artisanal fisheries, and we want them to make a real contribution to the countries' economies". This is not the case today. There are companies that, with a share capital of 100,000 CFA francs, supposedly own one or more fishing boats, each worth at least three billion CFA francs. "What effective control will this 'front man' have, and what control will the flag state have, over the actions of the company whose capital is almost entirely foreign?"

SUSTAINABLE AQUACULTURE DEVELOPMENT THAT DOES NOT DEPEND ON FISHMEAL

Another aspect that makes Gaoussou Gueye react is the insistence of the President of the Republic to pursue the development of aquaculture as an engine of growth of the Plan Senegal Emergent (PSE). "What we see of aquaculture today is above all the proliferation of fishmeal factories. This fishmeal is exported to feed livestock and farmed fish. If there is a development of aquaculture in Africa, it cannot be an aquaculture that depends on fishmeal."

The installation of fishmeal factories, often by foreign companies, particularly Chinese, is spreading in West Africa. This expansion started about ten years ago in countries like Mauritania, and has since spread to Senegal and the Gambia, and is now reaching countries like Sierra Leone: "These factories are decimating the resources of small pelagics, which are our 'food safety net'." Gueye explains that artisanal fishermen are even being pushed into supplying these factories, causing many women fish processors to lose their jobs. "These factories are polluting our air and our coastal marine environment, creating public health problems. We need to close these factories, for the protection of our communities and fisheries resources."

The growth of fishmeal factories in West Africa has increased pressure on stocks of small pelagic fish, particularly overexploited sardinella, which are the staple food of the region's populations. Photo: Mamadou Aliou Diallo/REJOPRA.

For Gaoussou Gueye, the focus for the implementation of the PSE should be on artisanal fishing: "As the PSE indicates, fishing has a ripple effect on the other sectors of the industry (such as seafood processing) and promotes a high rate of employment for women. Today, Senegal is one of the ten countries in the world that supports the implementation of the FAO Guidelines for Sustainable Artisanal Fisheries, through the participatory development and implementation of a national action plan”. For him, this is a golden opportunity to revive the artisanal fisheries sector, which needs well-targeted support to recover from the management of the Covid pandemic, which seriously affected the sector's activities.

Gaoussou Guèye therefore welcomes President Macky Sall's request to the Minister of Fisheries and Maritime Economy, made during the March 2021 Council of Ministers, "to engage in consultations with all stakeholders, in order to implement, from June 2021, an inclusive national strategy for the sustainable revival of artisanal fisheries". For the president of APRAPAM, "we must make this Presidential Council an inclusive meeting, with the consultation of all stakeholders in the sector, from carpenters to fishermen, from porters to women fish processors, to fishmongers, without forgetting researchers, FOs, etc." This consultation, which should contribute to the Presidential Council on Fisheries at the end of May, is eagerly awaited.

Banner photo: Mamadou Aliou Diallo/Courtesy of CAOPA.

---