ONE evening in Tombo, as fish buyers throng the seafront, an argument erupts at the far end of the harbour. Angry voices waft through the air, as Pa Seaport, the master fisherman of Sierra Leone, tries to solve a heated dispute between local fishermen and a South Korean man. They accuse him of damaging their nets with his trawler, which, they say, was heading to an area where fishing is banned.
This squabble points to a much bigger problem. In Sierra Leone nearly half the population does not have enough to eat, and fish make up most of what little protein people get. But the country’s once-plentiful shoals, combined with its weak government, have lured a flotilla of unscrupulous foreign trawlers to its waters. Most of the trawlers fly Chinese flags, though dozens also sail from South Korea, Italy, Guinea and Russia. Their combined catch is pushing Sierra Leone’s fisheries to the brink of collapse.
Sierra Leone is not alone in facing this...Continue reading
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