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The DDG of Fisheries, Ms Greta Apelgren-Nakardien, announced a new timetable for the allocation of fishing rights today.  Picture of the timetable below, courtesy of Colleen Jacka, editor of Maritime Review Africa .  It is incredible that this department thinks that we are as gullible as they are illiterate in basic South African law and fishing rights allocation processes.  Their "amended" timetable firstly contradicts what the DDG herself stated at the press briefing today (28 February 2013) regarding the appointment of a service provider to oversee the allocation process. The DDG stated that she hoped the service provider to oversee the allocation process would be appointed by June 2013 (that is realistic). The original timetable published last year stated that the service provider ought to have been appointed by November 2012. Despite the fact that the appointment date for service providers in the two versions differ by more than 7 months, both time...

Feike has made the Opinion Pages in this morning's Cape Times (iol.co.za); the Business Watch editorial in the Business Report (businessreport.co.za); and the editorial in the Business Day .

Palesa Mokomele, the Fisheries Minister's spokesperson, writes in the Cape Times this morning that we should give the fisheries department a chance to implement its turn-around strategy. She was responding to a Cape Times editorial titled "Fisheries rots from the head" (21 February 2013).  Ms Mokomele - as usual - makes a number of rather foolish comments but there are two that require an urgent response.  Firstly, Ms Mokomele's closing plea to give the fisheries department a chance to implement its turn around strategy is contemptuous in the extreme. Why is there a "turn around strategy" when we are told by Ms Mokomele and the DDG of Fisheries that Feike, the DA and the media are manufacturing and lying about the supposed crises afflicting the fisheries department? Further, the fisheries department which is led by a DDG with zero knowledge of and experience in fisheries; a fisheries department afflicted by massive numbers of vacancies and no pe...

The Fisheries Department (DAFF) this morning confirmed before the Portfolio Committee on Fisheries that it is unable to implement the most basic obligations required of it under the Marine Living Resources Act.  The Department's admissions are downright startling and contradict previous (false) assertions just last week that all was under control such as the hake trawl survey (which is under control but because the trawl industry has had to take charge of the survey and use an industry vessel). In particular, the DAFF - now under the leadership of Deputy Director-General, Greta Apelgren-Nakardien - has confirmed that it has failed to undertake fisheries compliance surveillance and therefore cannot say what fish has been illegally harvested from SA waters; the research cruises have failed and are now essentially being undertaken by industry and it is plainly apparent that the department will simply not be able to allocate fishing rights this year.  DAFF has admitted th...

The Green Party's Judith Sole was told for a second time that her application to review and set aside the decision by the Minister of Fisheries to allocate a TAC for the current 2013 lobster season was defective as she failed to serve the application on each of the more than 1200 right holders and 1500 interim relief exemption holders. The Deputy Judge President instructed Ms Sole that she is obliged to serve her papers on each and every one of these interested parties and that the Department of Fisheries could make available to her contact details for each of these parties. Alternatively, Ms Sole could approach the court for an order granting her an alternative or substituted form of service such as advertising her application in newspapers and placing copies of the application in fishery control officers along the coast. But a court order is required first. Feike had previously stated that Ms Sole's application was fatally flawed on this basis alone.  It is unclear if Ms ...

Reward excellence in the maritime and fisheries sectors by nominating a person or company for the 2012/2013 SAMSA Maritime Industry Awards. There are a number of award categories. For more details click here .

During 2012, we bitched and moaned plenty about the fact that the Department of Fisheries had done nothing by way of planning for the 2013 long term fishing rights allocation process. We also provided numerous solutions (in the beginning at least) but these became more like emergency evacuation procedures toward the end of last year as - and this is only our humble opinion - the time had run out for the department to timeously (and of course legally) allocate fishing rights.  This is not to say that the department can't allocate some 1000 fishing rights across 8 commercial fisheries as distinct as prawn trawl and traditional linefish. It can be done if one gayly ignores basic legal processes and haphazardly allocates fishing rights to those one likes most - the R800 million vessel management tender just happens to come to mind and so does a recent lobster TAC intervention! Back in November 2012, the department presented its rights allocation timetable to Parliament's P...

We understand now why DAFF did not want persons such as Feike's Shaheen Moolla and others in the farcical "consultative meeting" that was held on 1 February 2013. As we reported on 1 February, the Director of Stakeholder Liaison, Desmond Stevens, demanded that only certain persons (or representatives), including Shaheen Moolla and the West Coast Rock Lobster Industry Association - an official recognised industry body - leave the meeting. A number of "friendly voices" were allowed to remain even though they too were merely representing right holders (as one tends to do when a right holder is a legal entity!). What is apparent is that DAFF is running scared. They recognise their collective inability to legally defend the unlawful amendment of the 2012/2013 lobster season TAC. It also seems to be clear that they finally realise the substantial ecological and economic consequences of abandoning the lobster operational management procedure (OMP) and and the reco...

Two days ago the department of fisheries called an urgent meeting for midday on 1 February 2013 of all commercial right holders in the lobster fishery. The invitation called on right holders and representatives to attend. Feike's Shaheen Moolla attended the meeting on the instructions of a number of west coast based right holders.  Having signed in as a legal representative of the companies concerned, the meeting commenced. The department explained that the purpose of the meeting was to "clear the mud" in the media regarding the allegations pertaining to the lobster TAC. It is widely understood that the Minister of Fisheries unlawfully interfered in the setting of the current lobster TAC. The investigative programme, Carte Blanche, will shortly be exposing the shenanigans behind the TAC determination.  It was therefore extremely surprising when - after more than 30 minutes of the meeting having commenced - and after Feike's Shaheen Moolla stood up to ask ...