On 9 August 2023, the interprofessional council of artisanal fisheries in Senegal (CONIPAS) expressed its disagreement with the granting of any new industrial fishing licence by the Senegalese authorities, as it would be in contradiction with the advice of the advisory committee for the allocation of fishing licences (CCALP).
This committee, which includes CONIPAS, met on 19 July 2023 to examine eleven licences applications, including 10 new applications and 1 application for a change of category. These ten new applications, which specifically targeted small pelagics, - Yaboye (Sardinella), Diaye (Horse mackerel), Cobo (Ethmalose)-, received a negative opinion from the committee, including CONIPAS and the Dakar Thiaroye Oceanographic research Centre (CRODT), based on the latest scientific assessment of Senegal's fisheries resources showing that the fish stocks to be targeted are overexploited.
In response to these concerns, the Minister immediately announced that he had taken the decision not to allocate new licences to industrial fishing vessels. The fishing industry and civil society, including Greenpeace, welcomed this “courageous decision.”
However, since then, copies of licences awarded to trawlers of Chinese origin, such as the LU QING YUAN YU 050 (DAK1373) and GUOJIN 901 (DAK 1371), signed by the Minister on ... the 18 July 2023,- one day before the meeting of the CCALP-, have been circulating on social networks. CONIPAS finds this incomprehensible: the organisation points out that it did not attend any CCALP meeting at which applications for new fishing licences were approved. CONIPAS “condemns the issuing of any new fishing licences at a time when fish is so scarce that many Senegalese fishers and young people are taking to the sea to go to Europe in search of a better future.”
The Minister for Fisheries reportedly signed two licences for Chinese vessels one day before the meeting of the Advisory Committee for the Allocation of Fishing Licences (CCALP).
Whether or not these licences have actually been issued, what is at stake here, once again, is the lack of transparency in the procedure for granting industrial fishing licences in Senegal. This situation has been denounced, by Senegal artisanal fishers and civil society supporting them, for many years. In 2020, for example, a general mobilisation took place when the authorities were about to issue 54 industrial fishing licences - mainly for small pelagics and hake - 52 of which requested by Chinese vessels and two to Turkish seiners.
Faced with these demands, the authorities have tried to allay public concerns about the preservation of resources by regularly announcing commitments to greater transparency. In 2016, the Senegalese government made a public commitment to implement the Fisheries Transparency Initiative (FiTI). In August 2022, a three-year, $1.2 million project, funded by Ocean 5 and implemented by European NGOs (EJF and Trygg Mat Tracking), was launched to “promote transparency in the Senegalese fisheries sector, in particular through the publication of the lists of licensed vessels.” It is to be hoped this initiative will be more successful.
This comes as negotiations for the renewal of the Senegal EU fisheries agreement (SFPA) protocol are set to resume in the not-too-distant future, given that the current protocol will expire on 17 November 2024. The recent study on fisheries agreements published by the European Commission to inform its future approach, emphasises the importance of the transparency clause in fisheries agreements. This transparency clause “is essential to ensure the provision of relevant information to support the scientific analysis, in particular the information needed to assess the surplus.” The study notes that, at present, there is a transparency clause in most fisheries agreements between the EU and African countries: “The only exception is the SFPA with Senegal, where there is no explicit transparency clause in the SFPA or in the implementing protocols.”
The fight for transparency in Senegal's fishing industry is ongoing. For the APRAPAM association (“Association for the Promotion and Responsabilisation of Artisanal Maritime Fisheries Actors”), which has been involved in this struggle since its creation, “it is crucial to know what species are caught, where and for how long, in order to better manage fisheries resources. Government is therefore called upon to make complete and up-to-date information available and accessible to the public for the rational management of marine resources.”
However, transparency is not an end in itself, and must allow professionals to be more involved in fisheries management, especially given Senegal's commitment to co-management [Ed. See Senegal Fisheries’ Code, article 6]. APRAPAM is therefore asking that, in addition to the necessary transparency, the licence allocation committee should no longer be merely consultative, but should have the power to decide who is and who is not authorised to fish Senegal's 'blue gold'.
Banner photo: The artisanal fishing landing site at Kafountine, in Casamance (Senegal), by Agence MEDIAPROD.
Although the protocol does not allow European fleets to fish for small pelagics because they are overexploited, at least 4 European vessels have reportedly reflagged to Guinea-Bissau and are fishing for these species in the region, jeopardising the region's food security and competing with small-scale fisheries.