By Oyeniyi Iwakun and Patrick Imo
Dr. Parcy Ochuko Obatola is the Director/Head, Fisheries Resources Department, Nigeria Institute for Oceanography and Marine research, Lagos. In this exclusive interview with MMS Plus, she discusses the prospects in blue economy and the problems associated with aquaculture cum deep ocean fishing in Nigeria.
Enjoy it:
The Blue economy is becoming more pronounced in the global economic space, how would you appraise the efforts of your institute in pursuance of this interest?
When it comes to blue economy we are looking at the sustainable usage of the resources in our oceans and one thing that is peculiar to Nigeria is that we are blessed, because, the Atlantic Ocean borders our country and we have 853 kilometers coastline. So you can imagine the enormous impact that would have on the country as a whole and around the coastline we have a lot of communities and when we talk about blue economy, it has to do with the sustainable usage of the resources in our waters to grow our economy. That is the basic definition of blue economy.
We can grow our economy in various ways and even the major resources that Nigeria is exploiting now; crude oil is gotten from the ocean and the coastal areas. You can now see what blue economy is. In fact, there is more oil found offshore now than closer inshore and when it comes to the Nigerian Institute of oceanography, our own mandate is to look at the living resources in our oceans. So we are both doing our activities in the same space as it were and there is no way one will not hinge on the other but the essence of the research that is carried out is to look at what we have in our waters and how it can be sustainably utilized to grow our economy.
We are talking about fisheries resources; we talk about a lot of them now in our waters and the rate at which it is being exploited. What is the health of the fish stocks now and what are they doing? Presently in Nigeria, when we are talking about the fishing sector. There are three main sub-sectors; we have the capture fisheries, industrial fisheries and aquaculture. The industrial fisheries are also part of capture fisheries. So, the capture fisheries have two main sub-sectors namely: the industrial and artisanal fisheries and when we are talking about blue economy, the artisanal fisheries talk about the attitude at which fishing communities litter our coast line. From Badagry to Bakassi, there are so many fishing communities that depend on the ocean.
So, the blue economy is very vital for them as citizens of this nation and also for us, maybe those of us that are on hinterlands, in the cities and others because, over 70% of the fish domestically supplied in this country that we eat, are actually produced by these small scale fishermen that litter the coast line. So we can see the importance of ensuring that the resources they are exploiting are done rationally so it will take them to a stage where we would have enough fishes to eat because right now, when we look at the demand and supply of fishes in Nigeria, there is still a huge deficit. The demand is almost 3million metric tons per annum while the supply is about two million metric tons and there is still a deficit of over one million including those imported and those produced within this country. We are producing about 800,000 metric tons in Nigeria. So we can see the essence of why we actually need to carry out activities when it comes to blue economy.
Like I was saying, most of the fisheries that are exploited in Nigeria now are done at the inshore waters. Even though the ocean is there, we just see it as mere big ocean. It is also categorized into different zones and ecological areas. We have what we call the inshore waters, that is between zero to fifty meters depth of water and then offshore waters. So most of the fishing activities that is being done are done in the inshore waters right now and there is a lot of pressure on the resources in it and those pressures have translated into a situation where we have lesser catches, smaller sizes of fish and others that are evidences that there is a lot of pressure on the resources that we have in our inshore waters.
As to your question on what the institute is doing with regards to ensuring blue economy, part of our mandate is to look at resources. So we have carried out surveys and found out that there are resources in the deeper waters that the fishing industry can exploit so that the inshore waters would have a respite, if the pressure on them is reduced. We have other resources out there that can be exploited. We have Tuna resources and as I am talking to you right now, Nigeria as a nation is not exploiting it but that doesn’t mean that people are not exploiting it. People come from other places to exploit our tuna resources on our territorial waters.
Apart from that, we also have what we call harima-bondi. It is the kind of fish that can replace the imported sardine; in fact it was canned in this institute just to let the industry know what can be done. Tuna was also canned in this institute years back so that less pressure will be on the inshore resources for the industry to go further to exploit other resources out there and then, we have a deep water vessel right now.
I said earlier that there is a deficit in production between demand and supply of fish in Nigeria and it is aquaculture that actually breaks or reduces this gap because some capture fisheries from what I have explained, experience a lot of pressure on them and so it is not yielding as much as it should. So, for us to be able to bridge that gap our aquaculture needs to be up and running; although, aquaculture has experienced tremendous improvement in production in recent times. So the deep water vessel that the institute has now was mainly obtained for us to look at the resources that we have in our deeper waters and part of the resources that we have in our deeper waters is this mesopelagic resources, Tilapia fishes and these ones are very useful for the production of fish meal because when you are talking about aquaculture, the problem that has hindered it from being what it should be is the input and when you are talking of the running cost for aquaculture, feed is very crucial because about 70% of the running cost of an aquacultural establishment is usually on feed and a crucial component of that feed is fish meal and as we say right now, fish meal is mainly imported to Nigeria. So that’s another way of getting our money out via capital flight if we are able to substantiate it now that we know we have it. Our duty is to look at the quantum because another value chain that the fishing industry can also go into is getting the mesopelagic resource and turning it to the fish meal that will now be incorporated into the fish feed that the aquaculture sector uses.
We actually have a lot of resources but it is not about just having the resources. We need to work on how we can maximize or exploit them so that it will be useful for us in the country and also the artisanal sector. There is enough that can be done and we are playing our own role.
You talked about reducing the pressure on our inshore waters. What is being done to hype the investing public to be able to buy into this idea of deep ocean fishery?
Just like you said, we are a research institute and we usually have seminars and conferences and we usually invite the fishing industry to come. Now, I mentioned to you that some years back, we go to the deeper ocean, brought Tuna and Harima-bondi and canned them in brand, stock and in oil. Nigerian Institute of Oceanography and Marine Research (NIOMR) as a research institute has its mandate to pile up information and the industry is to buy into it but I believe God will help us because we haven’t outgrown the fast business and fast money mentality in Nigeria and when you want to go into any kind of food oriented business, you usually don’t make the money fast like that because for you to go into deep ocean fishery it is a different capital entirely.
I think that has always the major issue with the industry because it is not the kind of trawlers that you use in inshore waters that you use there. You need bigger vessels there and when you talk about bigger vessels, of course you are talking about bigger money. So, the tendency of wanting to change cannot be easy because you are still catching a lot of fishes in the inshore waters, but now everybody is realizing that there is need for us to do something about our inshore waters because the pressure on it is much. So, we have actually reached out in times past.
Apparently, these activities within the fishing communities is even beyond that, as a host of other activities like oil extraction and other mineral beneath the sea coupled with lots of beverages that goes into the ocean. Is the Ocean truly endangered as posited by United Nations and to what extent can it affect blue economy in Nigeria?
You were actually answering the questions yourself with the way you were asking because when you are talking about the blue economy, you are talking about the sustainability of the usage of the resources in the ocean and here we are impacting this same ocean with a lot of debris. You may take a visit to the Lagos lagoon and you will see a lot of debris ranging from plastics and others.
So, definitely, we have our own share in this ocean endangerment in Nigeria and these things affect the ecosystem and if anything affects the ecosystem, it is just like when you are in your house and there are lot of things distracting and obstructing you, you won’t be able to move as you should, so that is the stake of the resources that we have in our waters. Because of our anthropogenic activities, we impact our ways without properly sorting them out. Definitely, it would affect the ecosystem, the resources within it and it would come out to affect us. That is why we need to be responsible in our relationship with nature. We need to be responsible in fishing as well. There is what is called responsible fishery; it is a code of conduct that has been ratified by Nigeria and so many other countries. It is a United Nations SAO measure in trying to control and manage global fishing. So, we need to be responsible with whatever it is that we do, so that in the end we won’t be biting our fist or shoot ourselves in the leg.
As a research expert, what do you think could be done to curtail this over fishing in Nigeria?
One thing that is very clear and paramount about the fishing communities and even the industrial fishing is education and advocacy. There is a section in this fishery resources department that looks at extension and liaison services and there is another section that looks at fishing statistics and economy. Most of the time we are out there on the field interacting with the fishermen and we let them know the impact of what they are doing and one thing I will like you to know about the fishermen is that they are very knowledgeable because they live all their lives around the waters. So they have what is called indigenous knowledge. When you let them understand the impact of any activity that is hampering the resource, they will understand. Nobody would want to deliberately destroy the resource that they make their living on.
The problem at times that they let us know when we go out to the field is that because of all these anthropogenic activities, including sand mining and many more that have their own effects on the resources that these fishing communities rely on but their own aspect of it is that at times they use instruments that are actually not friendly. In Nigeria, we have fisheries act that regulates what and what to be done and when you let them realize that the problems with using small net sizes is that you remove both the juvenile and the adult and when you remove all those ones, what is going to grow to adulthood and repopulate the resource? So, they also know. There are even some communities where they have monitoring teams among themselves. So, it is not as if they are totally ignorant of the problems on ground. They know the import of the various acts of fishing activities that they do.
Do we now consider these acts as legal or illegal because as it stance, it appears unregulated?
Definitely, when you are doing something that is against the law, it is illegal. I agree that there is need for enforcement. There is what is called call illegal unregulated unreported fishing and it is a big issue worldwide. It is known as IEU fishing and it not only done by the big time fishermen, trawlers but also the artisanal fishermen. You may be fishing around where you are expected to fish but if you are using the wrong equipment, it is called an IEU act. And also in Nigeria, there are boundaries; the five nautical miles are the depth for artisanal fishermen while from there is for the industrial fishing. We have cases where the industrial comes to damage the depth of the artisanal fishermen. So, there is need for us to know how we can live together because they are all interwoven in the fishing industry.
There is now a management company worldwide known as Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries (EAF) because we have realized that it is not possible to say you want to manage fishing alone. The person that wants to come and sand fill or mine sand from that quarter would have his activities affect your own and the person that is exploiting oil would have his activities affecting yours too. So, ecosystem approach to fishing is a stakeholder’s platform, management orientation in which they look at all the various issues from different stakeholders and bring all of them to platform where they can discuss so that your activities would not be detrimental to mine and neither should mine be detrimental to yours.
Is that working in Nigeria?
We are doing ecosystem approach to fishing and there is a lot of course that has been on and people have been trained in various aspects of fishing. We have had seminars, trainings and workshops where we bring in the fishing industry including the artisanal and the industrial fisheries, the fishing managers and the federal department of fishing. It is not something that one person or one sector can just do. Now that we are in a technological stage where the whole world is talking about global village, we have realized that you may be doing an activity up there and it will be affecting someone down the water. The water flows and it carries whatever it sees on the way, so it is important for us to work hand in hand to be able to invest in what we have in order to achieve this blue economy.
How can aquaculture with fed-nutrients capable of having negative impacts on the ecosystem be managed?
That is why the issue of awareness and enlightenment is crucial. Before you use equipment in any fishing environment, it must be treated, that is what is being done worldwide.
Do we assume that government isn’t doing enough to promote the blue economy or is it that this research institute isn’t providing enough information and recommendations on what to do??
Research is a continuous thing. We are always here every day to do one thing or the other and I mentioned to you about various platforms that we have and the stakeholders that come there and even the department of fishing that is saddled with the administration and management of the output. I talked about the tuna that we have; the department of fisheries has a unit that is called Monitoring Control and Surveillance (MCS). For you to monitor, control and survey, you need platform and is that available today? And the fact is that they are working with the Nigerian Navy whose mandate is to protect our territorial waters. We have had interactions with them and we even have cases where they have come to the institute and we have given them information and presented papers to them at the workshops. So, it is a continuous thing. Management of any economy is a continuous state. I wouldn’t want to say that government isn’t doing anything, although they can do more as much as they have the ability.
How much do you thing the government would generate annually if there is focus to tap the marine resources.
Nigeria is fighting a lot of IEUs. There had been various platforms that have mentioned the amount of resources that Nigeria is losing. I do not want to give a specific figure because for you to give a specific figure, you have to possess all the statistics and indices which I do not have currently. Some have said it is about 50 billion and above but I don’t have the statistics.
Given the large size of our territorial waters, if Nigeria makes adequate provision, can’t we do without importing a single fish?
There is no country that doesn’t import, even China, because there is what we call consumers taste and value. It may not be much but the consumer may decide to go for particular species of fish that is not available in the country. Hence, the inevitability of importing it.
Do you see Nigeria surviving on the blue economy?
We will. Once we realize what is there for us and how it will help in creating jobs and improving livelihood, we will definitely work on it. Blue economy is not just for Nigeria, it is a global issue that involves so many things and we are already tapping into it because for the institute to go out there and discover that we have resources, it shows that we are on the right path. Also, if we can start exploiting the mesopelagic resources, then we can start producing fish meals here without importing.
