Marine capture fisheries of India: Challenges and opportunities

Marine fisheries production, which was only 0.5 million tonnes (mt) in 1950, increased through the time scale and peaked to 2.7 mt in 1997, Since by 1997 the production (2.2 mt) from inshore waters (< 50 m depth) reached the catchable potential (2.2 mt), scope for further increase in production from inshore waters is limited, The active fishers' population and the number and efficiency of fishing vessels have substantially increased. The improvements made so far on the craft and gear technologies with an objective to increase fish production are becoming counterproductive. Inappropriate exploitation patterns such as concentration of 80% of the total fishing effort in the inshore waters and over-dependence on trawlers are showing signs of detrimental effects on the fisheries, The catch rate of fishing vessels in several fishing centres is on the decline; the catch rate of the trawlers based at Chennai, for instance, has declined from 110.8 kg/h (1991) to 29.7 kg/h (1997), The fishing mortality coefficient (F) is higher than the natural mortality coefficient (M) for most of the exploited stocks, and the overall M:F proportion is 1:1.9. Fast-growing and high-fecund fishery groups such as prawns, cephalopods and many teleosts have been able to withstand exploitation thus far, but the slow-growing and/or low-fecund groups such as lobsters, sharks and catfishes are showing signs of vulnerability. As the fishers will not limit the fishing operations until zero profitability threshold is reached, there is a need to regulate the fishing activities and manage the fisheries. There are several biological, economic, social and political factors for the nonexistence of effective management policies and for the inadequate implementation of the existing policies. The concept of responsible fishing needs to be practised by introducing limited entry; temporal as well as spatial restrictions to sustain the coastal fisheries. Other options are to increase production by encouraging farsea fishing and utilizing remote sensing for locating potential fishing zones; increase coastal productivity by installing artificial fish habitats and sea-ranching; and to adopt coastal land-based mariculture and seafarming.