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ILLEGAL commercial fishing activities in municipal waters continue to threaten coastal communities and the country's food security. Making commercial fishing legal will push the country's fish stock to the brink of collapse, the country's food security organizers and participants of a Convergence Summit for the Protection of Municipal Waters said.
They attribute the strong opposition to commercial fishing in municipal fishing ground to the unfair competition between commercial fishers and artisanal and small fishers who depend mainly on fishing as a way of life.
Citing the 2017 National Stock Assessment Program report of the National Fisheries and Research Development Institute (NFRDI), Oceana said 87 percent of the country's fishing grounds are already overfished.
The Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (Pamalakaya), a summit participant, said they are banding together to strengthen the ranks of small-scale fisherfolk and civil society organizations for the protection of the municipal waters.
In a brief talk, Pamalakaya Secretary General Salvador France discussed the implications of the ruling.
There are over 2 million registered small fisherfolk across the country who stand to be affected, he said.
Summit participants expressed their alarm over the compounding impacts of the Malabon Regional Trial Court's decision that declared unconstitutional the preferential access accorded to municipal fisherfolk and the jurisdiction of local governments in the 15-kilometer municipal waters. The Supreme Court 1st Division issued a resolution last year, upholding...