The Philippines’ worst municipal fish output in 2024 mirrors the decade’s plunging trend

ALBAY — The country’s marine municipal production falls to a new low in 2024 with 802.77 thousand metric tons, the worst in two decades, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

While the PSA report is still preliminary, it is not an isolated case. Bulatlat’s analysis of government data from 2014 to 2023 shows a nationwide decline almost each year of the period.

The recent Court ruling allowing commercial fishing vessels to operate within the 15-kilometer municipal waters will exacerbate the situation, according to national fishers’ group PAMALAKAYA, which blames the failures of the Fisheries Code of 1998 and its amendments, such as the one that allowed “commercial fishing vessels [to] operate within the municipal waters with depth reaching 7 fathoms and above.”

This, combined with reclamation projects in coastal communities, has a significant impact on small fishers’ livelihoods. Fisherfolks in industrialized coastal provinces such as Bataan have lost their common fishing grounds to the country’s largest coal plant facility. 

According to migrant-resident Henry Bunag, the blame wasn’t entirely on the coal plant but also on commercial fishing vessels that they encountered within the municipal waters, one of which hit his boat once.

In the coastal barangay of Buayan in General Santos City, migrant-resident Elias Navidad noticed that their catch had decreased due to pollution from fishponds and a nearby coal plant.

He claimed that they used to catch shrimps, crabs, and trevally fish in two hours without having to go far, while his wife Virginia, who often goes fishing with him, thought that nowadays fishers who catch worth P1,000 ($17)  from an overnight fishing trip were lucky, compared to their previous peak catch of P4,000 ($69). 

Elias expressed his concern that the mangrove nursery may not be sufficient to filter out harmful antibiotic discharges and oil spills, while noting that others have already stopped fishing by selling their pumpboats at a discount.

Still about the oil spill impact, two years after the Verde Island Passage incident, small fishermen and their families in Mindoro, MIMAROPA Region, continue to face catch declines.

“We fisherfolk can still feel the impact of the oil spill, so we are hoping that we’ll finally receive just compensation,” Aldrin Villanueva, President of Koalisyon ng mga Mangingisda Apektado ng Oil Spill (KMAOS), said in a statement. 

MIMAROPA’s decade production, while the highest of the period, suffered a nearly eight percent loss, or a decline of 11,389 thousand metric tons. Ten more regions show the same downward trend, but typhoon-battered Bicol suffers the most, with a 56 percent loss.

This dramatic decrease in municipal fisheries production reflects the ailing sector’s continued abandonment and neglect, according to PAMALAKAYA National Chairperson Fernando Hicap, who also emphasized the Marcos administration’s failure to implement “substantial programs to uplift the lives of the impoverished fisherfolk.” (RTS, RVO)