Palk bay co-management concept introduced at Jaffna

IThere are number of unattended issues remaining among fisherfolk  communities in Northern province.
* Indian trawler issue
* Forceful migration of Southern fishers
* Destructive fishing gears
* Displacement and loss of land ownership
* Women Headed households and livelihoods
* Replacement of fishing gears and other infra structure development
Are some of the issues faced by the communities and need collective effort of all possible actors to address them.
The northern province fisher people's  unity leadets have been discussed the requirement of having a fisheries management structure for northern province.
At the world fisheries day held in Jaffna in 2015, N. M. Alam, the chairperson of northern province fisher peoples unity highlighted the necessity of such structure and urged from northern province fisheries minister N. Dineshwaran to give political leadership for the same.
As a result, NAFSO Convener and Prof. A. Soosaianandan of University of Jaffna drafted a concept note and validated it with fisher leaders from Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mannar and Mulaitivu.
The same report now published and shared among fishers and disseminated among possible players of the co-management platform.
The assistant director of fisheries Jaffna, fisheries leaders from fisheries coop federation, rural fisheries federation, Samasam leaders, NGOs, University teachers, trade union representatives and fisheries officials attended today meeting held at Jaffna.
The assistant director fisheries addressing the meeting said, "This is very important to addreaa management issues here in Jaffna and northern province. However if we as officials to engage officially we need the prior approval from the DG fisheries."
The fisher leadets agreed to engage to get the prior approval for the officials.
Mr. S. Ponnambalam, the chairperson of rural fisheries federation said, "During the time of previous regime, we had misunderstanding with NAFSO. We were mislead with wrong information. But we are now realized the important role played by NAFSO on fishing industry as a whole and for northern province fisher communities in particular. We strongly support and engage in such platform."
Prof. Sivachandran, the retired geography teacher said that he is fully support the process as he knows the ground realities of  there are hundreds of issues to be addressed. Our provincial councilors should  engage to address community issues. This is not happening today. People need a platform to raise their concerns. Added Prof. Sivachandran.
S. Rajachandran, the Samasam leader of Karainagar said, "this is very important structure and need to implement the platform activities soon."

Today meeting was successful as many actors in the fisheries field agreed to active engagement on co-management platform. Whether we address at the management platform or different political forum, some politicians whom we met today raised some sensitive political issues.
Mr. Gagendran, secretary, Tamil National People's Front at a separate meeting said, "The issues of southern migration will become serious once the GOSL is taking steps to settle army families in the north and recent case of Nawatkuli. This is going to be a serious issue in the northern province. This will damage any effort on reconciliaton."