According to the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR), the national government intends to help boost domestic output of fish as part of efforts to attain self-sufficiency by 2028.
It unveiled its strategic plan covering the years 2023 to 2028, which is focused on increasing productivity and reducing post-harvest losses of fishery and aquatic resources, even as local fishermen are being driven from traditional fishing grounds on our own exclusive economic zone by the Chinese Coast Guard.
The BFAR put the country’s fish sufficiency level at 92.5 percent net of trade, as of 2022, taking into account fish supplies that were exported and imported that year.
Data from the Philippine Statistics Authority show that fisheries output hit 4.3 million metric tons in 2023, up by 1.8 percent from the previous year.
The fisheries plan mirrors a long-standing goal of the government to attain self-sufficiency in rice, which has unfortunately been on a downtrend for three consecutive years, reaching a disappointing 77 percent in 2022.
Hopefully the BFAR can do better than its counterparts responsible for rice, as it said its newly unveiled strategic plan entails empowering fisherfolk, attaining climate resiliency in the fisheries sector, and bolstering fisheries governance. The agency also intends to modernize fisheries post-harvest and cold chain technologies and facilities, build common shared service facilities for fish products, and craft commodity-specific marketing plans.
Additionally, the BFAR means to work on establishing and facilitating direct linkage between fisherfolk and financial institutions, maximizing government assets on logistics, and partnering with the private sector in aid of marketing activities.
The experience and expertise of Department of Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr., who is a fishing tycoon, will hopefully be helpful in the realization of that goal of improving the country’s fisheries sector, which certainly needs a boost, especially in the light of China’s destructive encroachment into our traditional fishing grounds, along with the negative effects of climate change on the environment and the industry, which are just two of the major challenges that the sector is facing.*
