There was more bad news in the press this week regarding the countries abalone stocks. In a report presented to the portfolio committee by fisheries scientists and officials it is predicited that abalone will be totally extinct by the year 2035, if not sooner.

Once the abalone stock has completely disappeared, South Africa will have not only experienced a great loss from an environmental point of view, but also from a financial and job creation perspective.

As abalone stocks have diminished, younger and younger abalone have been poached and the slow-growing shellfish has simply not had enough time to mature and procreate. In certain areas abalone is already regarded as ‘functionally extinct’, meaning that there are not enough mature adult abalone left to breed.

This is a very sad state of affairs and one must ask where the blame lies?

This week the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) approved the global total allowable catch (TAC) for West Coast lobster for the 2012/13 season. News reports highlight that many in the industry, however, are concerned that the level is far to high, particularly in light of the critical West Coast rock lobster recovery plan.

Shaheen Moolla of Feike has once again been extremely outspoken about DAFF and Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson in particular, who has been accused of meddling in the TAC determination, stating, “Although much-vaunted in parliament as part of the department of fisheries ‘successes’ the implementation of … the rock lobster operational management procedure has essentially been tossed out of the window.”

With the Africana still in the Simon’s Town dockyard under repair and no indication of when the vessel will be able to return to work in order to complete the crucial pelagic survey, it has been reported in the press this week that the fisheries department has been thrown a lifeline. The fishing industry has come forward and offered to lend the fisheries department a vessel, the Compass Challenger, to replace the Africana, in order to ensure that the survey can continue.

Fisheries spokesman Lionel Adendorf said that the department welcomed the offer and was currently putting the necessary processes into place .

Congratulations to the fishing industry – it is not only a ‘boer’ that can make a plan.

The big fishing news of the week is that the West Coast rock lobster season is open. The announcement was made by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) on Tuesday morning and the season will run from November 15 to April1, 2013.

In typical DAFF style though, many permit seekers have been unable to obtain their permits at the Post Office and have, in fact, been turned away, as post office employees did not know what to charge for the permits.

Fisheries department spokesman, Lionel Adendorf stated that the price for a permit had remained unchanged from last year’s price of R92 and that this information had been communicated to post office staff.

Another case of miscommunication.

Officials from the fisheries branch of DAFF communicated to parliament this week that the number of abalone being poached was high above the legal quota and that abalone had become ‘functionally extinct’, particularly in the area from Hawston to Hermanus. This means that there are too few abalone left to be able to sufficiently increase the population.

This situation comes as no surprise to people within the industry who have been warning of this eventuality for years. Unfortunately, too little has been done too late. Where does the responibility and, more importantly, the solution lie?

Very gingerly mentioned in the press this week was the fact that the research vessel, the Africana, is still in the naval dockyard in Simon’s Town under repair. There has been no official word as to when the vessel will be able to resume its work, but would that word be worth much anyway?

The fisheries research vessel, the Africana, had to be towed into False Bay this week after an on board power failure apparently caused by water in the vessel’s fuel tanks.

The vessel, which has had a fair share of media attention since being handed over to the Navy, was in the process of completing the sardine and anchovy stock survey and had just rounded Cape Point when it lost power. The SA Navy, presently managing the research vessels for the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries reported that the SAS Amatola and the SAS Galeshwe had been sent to the vessel’s rescue.

Commander Cara Pratten, SA Navy spokeswoman, said that once an investigation had been concluded and all fuel lines had been checked, the Africana would be back at work by Thursday.

With the media hungry to follow up on this promise, the Africana was once again in the news when she did not sail on Thursday as planned. Commander Pratten was quoted as saying that if all goes according to plan the Africana will set sail again on Saturday afternoon. We shall wait and see.

Parliament also heard many complaints this week about the state of disrepair of the 30 year old vessel, which probably only has another five years of service left. The Department of Fisheries has requested an amount of R600 million from the Treasury to replace the vessel, but the request has not been approved as yet.

This week yet another meeting of the agriculture, forestry and fisheries portfolio committee took place with much of the discussion focusing on the management of South Africa’s research and patrol vessels. It would seem that after managing the vessels since March this year, the SA Navy has now expressed an interest in actually owning the vessels.

Acting deputy director-general of fisheries, Joseph Sebola, was quick to point out that at this point Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson had reached no decision regarding the fate of these vessels and was looking at various options – including outsourcing – which would possibly mean seperating the patrol from the research functions of these vessels.

There are some big decisions to be made. Let us hope that the minister can apply her mind to them quickly so that the fate of these extremely important vessels can be settled once and for all.

Failing this, we can expect some more negative news headlines closer to the 31 March deadline!

The Panos Earth is back in the news this week following the announcement that the once-stranded vessel’s crew will finally be paid some of the wages and living costs owed to them after the vessel was stranded. However, the victory is a small one as they will not be receiving the full amount owed. In a rather unusual occurrence, the preservation costs (the cost of keeping the ship afloat in false Bay) exceeded the amount that the ship was sold for, leaving the crew high and dry as there simply is no funding to pay all the creditors.

Alan Goldberg, maritime attorney for the captain and crew said, “It’s the first time I’ve come across a case like this in all the time I’ve been practising.” He further stated that all the creditors were going to lose out and most would not see a penny.

In other news, a study undertaken by a UN expert has revealed that ‘ocean-grabbing’ is becoming a real threat to food security in developing nations. The term ‘ocean-grabbing’ refers to aggressive industrial fishing by foreign fleets.

The report serves as a warning to all emerging maritime nations to tighten the rules for access to their waters by industrial fleets. Olivier de Schutter, author of the report stated, ‘We need to do more to reduce the capacity of the industrial fishing fleets and to manage the fish stocks in a much more sustainable way.’ The report further states that local fishing is regarded as far more efficient and less wasteful than industrial fishing.

Although making headlines, this may not be breaking news for those in the industry and one only has to look at the claim that this sort of ocean grabbing led to the increase in piracy around Africa to understand the implications.

Our own Fisheries Department will be answering questions on rights allocation, small scale fisheries and security of our fishing grounds next week in parliament – let’s wait and see what headlines they can create in this regard.

News that the Africana, set sail out of Simon’s Town harbour this week to conduct a six-week survey on sardine and anchovy was picked up by the press. This survey, one of the longest uninterrupted surveys in the world, has taken place annually since 1984. It is designed to assist the DAFF determine the allowable pelagic catch for the next year.

It stands to reason the the Miroshga incident continues to receive media attention. The initial inquiry into the capsizing of the tourist boat off Hout Bay has revealed that the accident was a result of ‘a succession of small bad decisions and incidents.’

The investigation by the SA Maritime Safety Authority (SAMSA) is not yet 100 percent complete. Dave Colly, SAMSA regional chief, has however, stated that ‘there were a lot of contributing factors, not one thing.’ Some of these included: shortcomings in maintenance and crew competence, as well as the fact that the skipper had not been certified for a passenger boat.

Media reports reveal that Southern Ambition Marine Safaris, the owner of the Miroshga, is currently in talks with lawyers to assist them with dealing with the investigation. Company operations manager, Gert Strauss, who faced the media for the first time this week, has said that an overall report would be released ‘any day now.’

The accident lead to the deaths of two people.

Perhaps we will see similar initiatives as instituted in the passenger bus sector be implemented in the marine transport of passengers. A comment from our Minister of Transport on an incident of this nature during transport month would not have been unwelcome.

It took another tragedy at sea to catapult the maritime industry back into the headlines. All eyes are on the investigation into the catamaran, Miroshga, which capsized near Duiker Island last Saturday resulting in the deaths of two people.

SAMSA officials are conducting an investigation into the cause of the accident and have indicated in the press that they have, in fact, identified the cause and will be releasing their findings soon.

In the mean time, praise is being heaped on all those who came to the rescue of the stricken vessel. They managed to rescue 37 of the 39 passengers and crew on board. There is a long list of all those involved; from rescue personnel to nearby vessels who assisted in the rescue operation.

The Japanese trawler, the Eihatsu Maru, which ran aground at Clifton in May this year is back in the news this week. The investigation undertaken by SAMSA into the incident has revealed that the captain of the vessel was asleep and had to be woken by crew members who realised that the vessel was in danger of running aground. By the time the captain had reacted, it was too late. In general it was found that the vessel had not been properly manned. This simple fact lead to it running aground and the eventual cost of R7 million for the salvage operation, of which, only R4 million could be recovered due to insurance issues.

Case closed and hopefully lessons (more) learned.

The big issue of the week in the maritime industry, however, is the marine tender report. The report was given to the National Assembly agriculture, forestry and fisheries portfolio committee by DA MP Pieter van Dalen, who apparently found it ‘in his post box.’ It is not clear why the report has not been officially released, but van Dalen promised to supply copies to his fellow MPs. This took place on Tuesday.

Reacting to the leak, the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries has suspended the investigation into the tender claiming that they had lost faith in Ernst & Young. The Department is also claiming that there are now two different copies of the report: one given to them by Ernst & Young, apparently not naming any implicated officials and a second one, leaked to the DA, naming officials.

With a copy of the report now in open circulation, it will be interesting to watch who makes the next move.

The Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Tina Joemat-Pettersson has made an almost daily appearance in the press this week. She is being criticised from all sides regarding the running of her department and the DA is vying for her dismissal.

Annette Steyn, DA spokeswoman was quoted as saying that the performance of the minister’s department provided ‘ample ground’ for her dismissal. She also stated that the portfolio committee had been unable to meet with the minister in order to discuss their concerns. A rather regular occurance.

On Tuesday, the minister did finally make an appearance at the portfolio committee meeting on agriculture, forestry and fisheries, to present the department’s annual report.

In August it was reported by the City Press that a government document showed that the minister would contribute R800 million to the Nkanda ‘Zumaville’ development project.

Both the minister and her spokesman, Sipho Ntombela, vehemently denied the allocation of these funds, saying that it simply never happened.

Adding to the department’s woes is a report from the auditor-general stating that, amongst many other failings, for the year 2011/12, despite only achieving 49 percent of its targets, the department had managed to spend 99 percent ot its budget.

Surely enough is enough. There is so much irregularity and in-fighting and investigation going on within this department that maybe some new leadership would not be such a terrible idea. New leadership; armed with and extremely large broom.

Rather more significant news this week in the world of fisheries was the convergence of 57 maritime nations at the IMO’s Diplomatic Conference on the Safety of Fishing Vessels.

Hosted in Cape Town after some intense lobbying from SAMSA, there was some media presence at the event and the significance of the Cape Town Agreement was reported on, but perhaps more trumpet blowing could have lauded this milestone.

We will be covering the important agreement in the current issue and aim to blow the trumpet for the very profound contribution made by one of our countrymen!

The media jumped on the extreme revelations and accusations made by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in their press release on Monday. Just one day later, however, the Department was involved in some back pedaling as they engaged with the press at their own press conference.

When questioned on the matter, Sipho Ntombela, acting deputy-director for the department would not be drawn, but would only say that the preliminary investigation only provided indications that there was ‘something wrong’ with the R1.6 billion tender to manage South Africa’s marine research and patrol ships. A far cry from what was revealed during the press conference.

Clare Gomes, spokeswoman for Smit Amandla Marine is quoted in the media saying that Smit was ‘astounded by the substantially revised press statement, which materially waters down the allegations.’ She also stated that Smit is ‘seeking legal recourse and a formal process to defend Smit Amandla Marine and to clear our name.’

It looks like DAFF has jumped the gun on this one. Surely when dealing with allegations as serious and potentially damaging as these, there should be a more definite protocol to follow; including waiting for all investigations to be finalised and informing all parties concerned of these findings. But then DAFF really is not known for following protocol.

One thing is for sure – this story is far from over. Possibly the most holistic version of this disastrous tale in the media thus far was the article published by Noseweek – and certainly one can be sure that there is more going on behind the scenes than we are lead to believe.

Our marine and research vessels are back in the news this week. The Algoa, staffed by Smit personnel, sailed from Simon’s Town to East London last week in order to undergo some maintenance before heading out on a research cruise.

The vessel has officially been transferred out of the control of the SA Navy and is now under the control of the Department of Environmental Affairs and, interestingly, not the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF). According to Fisheries spokesman, Lionel Adendorf this was simply due to the fact that 80 percent of the work done by the Algoa was for the Department of Environmental Affairs and not DAFF.

Clare Gomes, spokeswoman for Smit said that the Algoa would resume research cruises as of the end of October. Due to a number of reasons, the state-of-the-art vessels have conducted no offshore patrols since the navy took control of them in early April. Let us hope that this situation is finally on the way to being righted.

According to an article published in the Cape Times this week, incidents of piracy seem to be on the decline. Figures show that in 2010 a total of 47 vessels were seized by pirates and this year that number has dropped to just five. Obviously armed guards aboard cargo vessels and a large international naval presence have helped to deter pirate activity and although it is too early to declare any kind of victory, it would seem that there is some hope that the end may be in sight.

Today’s review is based on the stunned silence that has greeted readers of the Cape Times this week. For the entire week, the maritime industry has gone unmentioned, which must mean that there have been no major maritime events worth reporting.

Members of the Department of Agricultre, Forestry and Fisheries have decided to play nice for a whole week and the results of the long awaited public protectors report, investigating alleged corruption within the fisheries department, have still not been released.

All of this would seem highly unlikely, but let us enjoy the calm before the storm.