West Visayas small fishers push for anti-Illegal fishing drive

Leaders of the Panay-Negros-Guimaras Crab Fishers Alliance (PANEG-CA), in collaboration with the NGOs for Fisheries Reforms (NFR) and PRRM-Negros, held on Sept.9- 11, 2025 an I-FIT Assessment and IUU Fishing Reduction Planning at Business Inn Hotel, Bacolod City.

The event, the first ever civil society-led activity on Anti-IUU Fishing in Negros Occidental, was held consecutively on Sept. 9- 10 for Victorias City and Sept. 11-12 for the Municipality of Manapla.

A total of 41 participants, mostly small fisher leaders and representatives of local Fisheries and Aquatic Resource Management Councils (FARMCs) from various LGUs including from Guimaras province participated in the planning.

Personnel from the Department of Agriculture -Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (DA- BFAR) assisted in the facilitation of topics especially on the Ecosystems Approach to Fisheries Management ( EAFM) and on the use of the IUU Fishing Threat Reduction Tool ( I- FIT) as guide to the IUU Fishing Reduction Plan.The BFAR team was ably led by its regional fisheries staff Jayson Paraiso , and support from local staff Froilan Dela Cruz and Ronalisa Gaurama.

A representative of Victorias City Mayor Abelardo Bantug spoke in his behalf during the Sept. 9 opening session but Fisheries staff from the two LGUs failed to attend the planning, citing one reason or another, which tend to show how fisheries concerns were also being considered at the LGU levels.

Highlights of the event were topics on I-FIT and review of the results of its scoring in the two LGUs, review of EAFM, input on EAFM and strategic planning, and workshops to come up with a semestral Anti-IUU Fishing Reduction Plan.

The IUU Reduction Planning was the latest capacity- building program for PANEG-CA under the OCEAN project.

Gerry Bedoya, PANEG-CA chair and Manapla small fisher leader, said the IUU Fishing Reduction Planning reinforced the recent activities under the NFR’ s OCEAN project including the recent conduct of trainings on Advocacy and Communications. According to him, such planning will put more teeth in their local campaigns against Illegal fishing. Among the major prevalent illegal fishing practices in Negros and Guimaras included fishing without permits or unauthorized fishing, trawl fishing. Danish Seine or Hulbot2, use of compressors, and use of fine mesh nets, etc.

Bacolod City small fisher leader Eduardo Espinosa thanked BFAR for helping facilitate the activity and said the planning was urgent and important as it set the tone to make their anti- illegal fishing campaign more sustained and effective.

PRRM-Negros Area Coordinator Hazel Aghon said the IUU Reduction Plan could only be actualized well with full support from the LGUs and their FARMCs. We could only implement the plan better with the support from our LGU partners especially from their fisheries unit.* (ERB)