It’s a confounding correlation: the more European Union trawlers we allow to fish in our waters, the more Mauritians have to pay for fresh fish. The renting out of our territorial waters to foreign fishing vessels for peccadilloes is just another feather in government’s sellout cap, along with the IRS and the recent privatization drive. The trouble is of course that the impact of this policy decision, if it can even be called that, will be felt long after those who made it have been put out to pasture. Contrast this short-term view with the Rodrigues Regional Assembly’s (RRA) decision to implement a two-month ban on octopus fishing at great political expense. These two approaches to managing our fisheries couldn’t be more different the former privileges quick gains at immense cost to our fish stocks, whereas the latter aims to ensure the sustainability of an important local cottage industry.

The EU has a long, ugly history of fi shing seas empty. It started with the Mediterranean before reaching outwards and raiding large swaths of the Indian and Atlantic oceans. And despite the fact that it employs relatively few people, the fi shing industry wields signifi cant influence in the Brussels technocracy, which explains why the issue of quotas has proven to be so contentious (there’s also the little matter of the tragedy of the commons to contend with). Of course, that doesn’t explain why Port-Louis has been so stupendously supine by handing out fishing licenses for fun, or as it’s known euphemistically, by providing “competitive fish licensing and registration fees”.

Such State-sanctioned largesse would be offensive enough on its own, but after we’ve seen what weak regulation and even weaker enforcement have done to our lagoons, it’s downright insulting. You see, there’s nothing wrong with making optimal use of our Economic Exclusive Zone (EEZ), a zone a thousand times larger than our land area. Indeed, it’s a matter of urgency that we tap into this resource-rich zone, all the more so given how we seem to be running out of options on land. What we shouldn’t however be doing is allowing foreign fishing boats to pillage our fish stocks in exchange for a fistful of rupees. Around half of the Rs26.4 million we’re being paid annually under the Fishing Partnership Agreement has apparently been earmarked to “support the fi sheries policy of Mauritius”.

Now that’s very considerate, but going by past form, there may well be nothing left by the time our “fishing partners” are done. Mercifully, someone, somewhere in the republic does not ascribe to this mercantilist mindset. That someone is Richard Payendee, the fi sheries, environment and tourism commissioner of the RRA, who, along with his boss, Serge Clair, has given octopus stocks a much needed lease of life thanks to a two-month ban on mollusk fishing activities.

It hasn’t been easy of course, but nothing worthwhile ever is. Sadly, the rupee signs in the eyes of decision-makers here make it hard for them to see this.

Nicholas RAINER