A pan-African maritime security gathering in the continent has revealed that western and Asian nations and companies have exploited and fish grab from Africa tremendously. African Union has organized the two-day continental conference in Addis Ababa which was also attended by representatives from the United Nations and European Union.
The main agenda of the conference was piracy and illegal fishing. The African Union lamented that after decades after attaining independence, African countries were still losing sea resources, namely fish, to western nations. Fish is the cheapest source of protein for millions of African poor communities.
AU peace and security director El Ghassim Wane explained that Africa has failed to enforce measures to defend its water territories. Poor information sharing experience among African nations also aggravates the situation. FAO figures show that Africa is losing billions of dollars a year from illegal fish grabbing. FAO cited a recently a growing trend of illegal fishing in eastern, western, and south western Africa.
Alhaji Jallow, a senior fisheries expert of FAO said illegal incursion in prohibited water areas and misuse of authorisation are now growing trends. According to FAO, some 80 percent of global fish stock was consumed in the last one decade. Currently 50 per cent of global fishing is illegal. Somali Deputy Prime Minister Abdulrahman Aden Ibrahim Ibbi said besides the country being plagues by piracy, it is also suffering from illegal fishing and toxic chemical dumping since 1990’s.
