Today's Edition
SHUROUQ AWAD (DUBAI)
The Ministry of Climate Change and Environment has announced four main zones where fishing activities are banned, including the "cement caves areas", the "no-fishing ports", marine reserves, and protected areas through the recently launched Hadaaq smartphone app.
Hadaaq is an electronic guide for all fishermen across the country, providing them with access to legislation governing the fishing sector in the UAE.
The ministry also allocated three service-based areas for fishermen; these include ports allocated for this category, landing sites, and fish markets. The five designated fishing sites and the fishing gear permitted for use in them were determined based on the types of fish in each area and their breeding season.
The ministry said that identifying fishing zones aims to enhance food security through ensuring the development and sustainability of fish wealth, as well as increasing adherence to legislation organising the fishing sector through the effective regulation of the fishing profession, in alignment with the directions of the state and its smart services strategy.
This step also aims to tackle the issue of the intertwining of fishing gear in the sea due to the lack of a system identifying fishing zones and the gear permitted for use in them, in addition to supporting sustainable development goals (SDGs) indicators, particularly SDG 14, pertaining to marine life.
The ministry affirmed its commitment to attaching great importance to "ensuring the development and sustainability of fish wealth", as one of the components to realising local food security.
It noted that the protection and development of living aquatic resources in the UAE is one of the main priorities, through which the state works on implementing the best sustainable systems to achieve food security through developing fish wealth, enhancing biological diversity, ensuring the sustainability of all relevant sectors, and contributing to reducing the carbon footprint for these sectors.
Future Plans
The Ministry said that it's in the process of implementing several plans for the development of living aquatic resources in cooperation with its partners, such as examining new boat licences and looking into ways to replace inactive licences with new ones, as well as regulating the exports of aquatic creatures, and regulating fishing using jet skis.
It's also working on empowering women to work in the fishing sector, developing the infrastructure for fishing ports, enhancing the security and safety of fishermen, improving vital facilities through maintenance projects, and rehabilitating a number of ports.
