The announcement this week that the catches for the first loligo season for 2012 totaled 34,900 metric tones, equal to more than the entire catch for 2011, coincides with the 25th anniversary of the opening of the Falkland Island fishery.
Falkland Islands fishing companies had tons of reasons to be cheerful as the first Loligo squid season of 2012 drew to a close last weekend.
The Falkland Islands government has issued a high number of licenses for the 2012 Ilex season with almost a hundred jiggers operating which compares positively to previous years, according to the Director of Natural Resources John Barton.
It is the generation of thirty-something who as children were the first to benefit from well-funded primary and secondary education following the Islands’ economic turn-around in the late 1980’s. They were the first generation of locally educated children who could graduate in careers of their choice.
Alternative ways to charge Falklands’ fishing licence fees have been examined in a report presented to representatives of the fishing industry as well as Member of the Legislative Assembly Gavin Short and the Director of Natural Resources John Barton this week.
Some fishing companies are feeling “a bit hard done by” having been caught out by a change in the Falkland Islands Government Fisheries Department refunds policy implemented for 2011, said Director of Fisheries John Barton.
Following on from the appearance of what appears to have been more jiggers than normal in Stanley harbour recently, Falkland Islands Director of Natural Resources John Barton says there are some 80 Illex jiggers licensed and fishing in Falkland Islands zones at present, and 88 jigging licences have been issued.
MORE than thirty, mainly Taiwanese, jiggers crowded into Stanley Harbour early this week prior to the beginning of the Falkland Islands Illex fishery season.
More than 15,000 tonnes of rock cod has been discarded so far this year from the Falkland Islands finfish fisheries. Rock cod has taken over from Southern Blue Whiting as the key finfish species in local waters, but such high volumes of waste are a concern for industry regulators.
DUE to planned port developments in the Falkland Islands, fishery executives there appear unworried by Argentina’s most recent attempt to interfere in their fishing industry.