TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Maritime and Fisheries Affairs Minister Susi Pudjiastuti said that President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo and Vice President Jusuf Kalla's administration has made many improvements on the field of maritime and fisheries in the past two years. One of the improvements, according to Susi, is the increase of the fisheries sector gross domestic product (GDP), which exceeds the country's national GDP.
"Fishermen trade value and fish production has increased, but of course we still have unfinished home works," Susi said on Thursday, October 20, 2016.
According to Susi, her ministry have continues to maintain the availability of marine resources, such as fish, fishermen, and the marine ecosystem within the last two years. Susi explained that the main focus of her ministry was to eradicate illegal fishing. "Those foreign ships have robbed us of our fish," Susi said.
Susi added that before the ministry decided to focus on eradicating illegal fishing, around 7,000 foreign ships often enter Indonesian waters, catch fishes illegally, and immediately exported them. As a result, Susi said, the number of fishermen from 2003 to 2010 has declined from 1,6 million to just around 800,000.
Not only the number of fishermen, Susi said that illegal fishing has also decreased the number of Indonesian fish production capacity. According to Susi, in the year 2000, the total amount of Indonesian fish production capacity had reached 15.5 tons. The number however, declined to 4.5 tons because of illegal fishing. Later, the number increased to 6.5 tons, 7.3 tons, and currently recorded to be at 9.9 tons. "This is the direct result of eradicating illegal fishing," Susi said.
ODELIA SINAGA
