Fisheries industry stakeholders lamented the use of “flawed” data by government officials in arriving at the supply shortfall for small pelagic fishes, noting that it resulted in an excessive approved import volume.
Rosanna Bernadette Contreras, who represents the aquaculture sector at the National Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Management Council (NFARMC), said she expressed her concerns with the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) data used by government officials to assess the country’ supply situation for small pelagic fishes.
“First of all, the council evaluated the basis for the computation of the shortfall. [Government officials] used PSA data. And the industry knows that the PSA data is lacking, there’s a waterloo in using that data,” Contreras said during a recent virtual news briefing.
“And that is where and why discussions took long,” Contreras, who is also the executive director of Socsksargen Federation of Fishing & Allied Industries Inc., added.
Contreras revealed that the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) presented to the NFARMC a supply deficit of about 45,000 metric tons for the fourth quarter or 15,000 MT for every month of the closed fishing season. Contreras added that the BFAR rounded off the volume to 50,000 MT.
Furthermore, Contreras said BFAR also proposed a 15,000 MT import volume for the first quarter to serve as a buffer stock, making the total import volume proposal to 65,000 MT.
“Noting that the aquaculture is more positive in contributing to the supply due to the already planned production and investments, we recommended a 30,000 MT import volume for the fourth quarter,” she said.
“We told them that we could evaluate first the results of the initial 30,000 MT, if it materializes, then determine afterward if we need to import an additional volume for the first quarter,” she added.
Contreras said the NFARMC discussions on the importation took more than seven hours.
Norbert Chingcuanco of Feedmix Specialist Inc. and convener of Tugon Kabuhayan agreed with Contreras that the aquaculture sector and municipal fishers could easily fill some of the supply deficit due to the three-month long closed fishing season for commercial vessels.
“Our perspective is that the aquaculture sector and municipal fishers can easily fill the 15,000 MT monthly supply deficit. We can harvest more and they can catch more. We are ready even before,” he said.
Chingcuanco also questioned the government for using PSA data to come up with the small pelagic fish supply situation while the agency is in the middle of improving its methodology for fisheries surveys.
“We hope that they waited for the new methodology of the PSA before analyzing the situation. But BFAR believed in PSA more than the industry players,” he said during the briefing.
“We gave our own supply projections but they discounted it by 20 percent or more,” he added.
Chingcuanco revealed that the PSA is increasing the sampling sites for its fisheries survey from 7,000 to about 35,000, which would be implemented by next year. This was revealed during a meeting with PSA and industry players, Chingcuanco said.
“PSA itself admitted that they have changed their sampling methodologies, sampling size and questionnaires,” he said.
“They admitted that their data does not reflect the reality on the ground. From 7,000 to 35,000 sampling sites that’s a huge jump. PSA met with us and questioned their own system,” he added.
Last week, Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar greenlighted the 60,000-MT importation of small pelagic fishes, such as galunggong, for wet market sale to augment the country’s domestic supply in anticipation of the closed fishing season.
In May, Tugon Kabuhayan urged the government to allow more funds to improve the data collection and production of the PSA to provide policy-makers with a better picture of the country’s fish supply situation.
Citing reports from the ground, the group claimed that the PSA’s data on fisheries production are too conservative. For example aquaculture production in Davao doesn’t capture even half of the total output of the aquaculture fishers in the region, the group added.
The group said there is no worry in the PSA’s data collection for commercial fishing since these vessels unload in government ports, however, they pointed out that data gathering for municipal fishing would be difficult since small-scale fishermen are scattered in the country.
The group earlier warned that the government is running the risk of coming up with wrong policy decisions on fisheries, such as on importation, if they are using “unrealistic” data.