TABUK CITY, Kalinga – Illegal fishing with the use of electric gadgets and explosives is rampant in the Chico River in Tabuk City with the illegal fishers openly going about their illegal activities as though these were not against the law.
The El Nino phenomenon has worsened the problem because it is easier to catch fish with these illegal means when the water is shallow.
The electric gadget which is referred to locally as koryente is powered by a 12-volt battery and equipped with two rods to one of which the net is fixed. Both rods conduct electricity to the water. Fish which come within the range of the power of the gadget are temporarily stunned enough for the fisher to catch them with the net.
A local fisherman who spoke on condition of anonymity estimated that as many as 100 fishermen using the koryente fish in a 15-kilometer stretch of the Chico River from Calanan, Tabuk City, to Magaogao in Pinukpuk, Kalinga during weekdays and there are even more during weekends when people go for picnics.
He said that many of these koryente fishers depend on fishing for much of their livelihood. Their wives sell their catch in the barangays or in the public market during market days.
The fisherman who admits that he also uses the koryente at times said that this method of fishing stunts and makes sterile the affected fish which get away but that on the other hand, it is a very easy and economical way of catching fish and that there are fish such as the “wading” which is considered a delicacy in the city but which cannot be caught by any other means but the koryente.
The fisherman also stressed that no matter the harm the koryente inflicts on the fish population, it is nothing compared to the devastation wrought by dynamite fishing which he says has become a common occurrence in the Chico River since the water started to drop in January.
He said that the usage of dynamite has caused the lower catch of fishers using nets and koryente since January. He added that none of the deep portions of the river from Calanan to Magaogao have been spared from the explosions of dynamites and that there are perhaps some of these portions that have already been dynamited several times since January. .
Bureau of Fish and Aquatic Resources provincial officer Joyce Ducyogen affirms the statements of the fisherman on the widespread usage of dynamite and koryente in the Chico River saying this is the reason she keeps telling barangay officials and residents wherever she goes of the bad effects of these methods of fishing and also has conducted trainings on the enforcement of anti-illegal fishing laws among the police and the army and barangay officials and tanods.
The problem, according to Ducyogen, is that barangay officials and police and army officers do not personally attend the trainings but send representatives.
Under the Wildlife Resources Conservation and Protection Act (RA9147), the conservation and protection of fish and other aquatic resources is vested in the Department of Agriculture where the BFAR is an office.
She said that the common reaction from barangay officials is that it is hard to implement ordinances against illegal fishing because some residents depend on the koryente for their livelihood and that the light penalties imposed by the ordinances do not deter the illegal fishers.
She said that she is advising them to just confiscate the gadgets and burn them infront of their barangay halls to put some teeth to the laws against illegal fishing.
She admitted that the BFAR has yet to deputize barangay officials or tanods as fish wardens in Kalinga. Deputized fish wardens could arrest illegal fishers.
She quickly added that in the absence of deputized wardens, the police and the military are always there to take on the job of enforcing anti-illegal fishing laws they being the mandated enforces or anti-illegal fishing laws.
Tabuk City chief of police Chief Inspector Pablo Baliwag bristled at the insinuation that the police is sleeping on the job when it comes to illegal fishing in the city specially the Chico River.
He said that being the lead agency, the BFAR should organize and lead operations against illegal fishers as well as help the police with the prosecution of those who will be arrested.
He commented that he observed that illegal fishing cases seldom prosper in the province.
He stressed that unlike the BFAR whose only mandate is about fish and aquatic resources, the police is involved in more important tasks all geared towards the maintenance of peace and order in the city.
While Ducyogen and Baliwag could not agree on who really should spearhead the fight against illegal fishing, the Chico River and other bodies of water in the city are being threatened of permanently losing their fish and other aquatic inhabitants through koryente and dynamite. **By Estanislao Albano Jr., ZZW
