By:Justicia Shipena
Fisheries minister Derek Klazen has expressed concern about the number of fish consumed by seals per year in Namibia, terming it “unacceptable”.
Klazen was responding to a motion by member of parliament Mike Kavekotora in the National Assembly regarding Namibian fish stocks facing depletion as a result of seals stock proliferation.
According to Klazen, in terms of the Marine Resources Act, Act 27 of 2000, seals are defined as living marine resources.
“As Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources, the amount of fish estimated to be consumed by seals per year is simply unacceptable,” he said.
However, he stated that the opinions of seal conservationists and environmentalists appear to be simply based on the belief that seals do not eat salads and pasta as humans do.
“They only eat fish, therefore let them eat as much fish as they are able to find in the waters,” Klazen reiterated the argument of activists.
He said this argument offers serious challenges to seals management, adding that they threaten advocating banning of trade in other fish species such as hake and horse mackerel if countries increase harvesting of seals.
He said they further threaten to advocate for western tourists to stay away from countries that harvest seals.
There are about 80,000 to 100,000 seals at Cape Cross in western Namibia.
Klazen added that these opinions from environmentalist groups affect the markets to which Namibia could export seals products.
“Countries with good markets for seal products are careful to buy seal products in the wake of them being sanctioned for other goods and services.”
This, he said, puts the fisheries ministry in a very difficult situation to manage the seals’ fishery.
He noted that the Namibian fisheries management regime is based on granting fishing rights which leads to annual scientific stock assessment surveys that aim to determine Total Allowable Catches (TACs) for quota-managed species.
On this, Klazen added that seals are one of the quota-managed species which means a TAC for seals harvesting is first determined before quotas are allocated to individual right holders to harvest their allocated quotas for that season.
He said the issue of the management of seals is not as simple as it is being portrayed to be.
He said international fisheries management conventions and agreements to which many developing states including Namibia are members make the management of seals in Namibia complicated.
“International environmentalist groups and consumers particularly in western countries pose challenges to national, sovereign fisheries management efforts,” he stated.
He also revealed that Namibian seals are listed on Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) as a threatened species.
This listing on the CITES Appendix II means that species is not necessarily threatened with extinction, but trade must be controlled in order to avoid utilisation that is incompatible with their survival.
“At present we are estimating the current seals population in Namibia to be between 1,5 to 2 million individuals or even more,” said the minister.
Klazen stressed that it is not the number of seals in Namibia that is a concern, it is more the quantities of fish that these seals eat per day.
In this line, he said one adult seal eats approximately 3.8 kg of fish per day.
“This means that 1.5 million seals would eat 5,700,000 Kg or 5,700 metric tons of fish per day or 2,080,500 metric tons of fish per year. This amount is about 4 times more than the annual combined TAC for hake, horse mackerel, and monk per year,” he explained.
In 2020, seal harvesting rights were granted to continue the utilisation of seals as any other marine resource in Namibia.
Klazen also pointed out that different seal harvesting methods have been under evaluation and efforts were applied to make seal processing factories in Henties Bay continue to operate.
Other options, according to Klazen, included looking at increasing the allocation of bulls as opposed to pups, lengthening the seals’ harvesting season, and improving on value-added products such as fish meal, omega-3 extracts, and leather products.
“We are evaluating the possibility of disrupting the mating process of the seals to decrease birth rates,” Klazenconcluded.
According to Kavekotora, the total allowable catch (TAC) and harvest of seals since 2017 shows a very disturbing trend.
“The TAC for pups and bulls over the five year period from 2017 to 2021 remained the same at 60,000 pups and 8,000 bulls respectively,” he said.
He added that the catches for pups over the years remained low, and dropped significantly from 25% of TAC in 2017 to 1% in 2020 and a marginal increase to 7% in 2021.
At the same time, Kavekotora said the percentage of bull harvested remained high ranging from 81% in 2017 to 92% in 2021.
“It is significant to note that over a ten-year period, it was only in 2012 and 2013 that the harvesting of pups went over 50%,”the lawmaker said.
The member of parliament argued that it is estimated that over two million Cape Fur Seals are natives of the southern African coastal area.
“In our country, where 75% of the Cape Fur Seals live, the annual hunting season takes place between August and November each year. The TAC in Namibia is set through the ‘so-called’ management procedure that was implemented in 1997,” he added.
Kavekotora stressed that statistics about seals in Namibia show that the current situation is not desirable nor is it in the interest of Namibia.
“The total seal population in Namibia is conservatively estimated at around 1.6 million seals. I am informed that just 15 years ago that figure stood at 180,000.”
He presented that on average one seal eats 4kg of fish per day, and that equates to 2,3 million tons of fish per annum, while the total allowable catch for all fish species is around 500,000 mt tons per annum.
In this line, he urged the National Assembly to extrapolate what the seal population would be in 15 years time under the current arrangement.
“That should send an alarm to any responsible leader in this country. Who cares about the sustainable utilisation of our marine resources,” he said.
He thus suggested that his motion be referred to a relevant parliamentary committee.
“Because a lot of analysis and information gathering is needed to derive an equitable methodology of harvesting seals in Namibia and to reach an equilibrium between our fish stock and the seal population.”
Minister Says Number Of Fish Eaten By Seals Is Unacceptable …as environmentalist opinions affect seal product exports
