Ministry mulls training fishermen as sea rangers
SERDANG: The Agriculture and Agro-based Industry Ministry (MOA) has announced plans to recruit local fishermen as sea rangers in the fight against foreign encroachment.
Its minister, Datuk Salahuddin Ayub, said foreign vessels encroaching on Malaysian waters was a longstanding issue, particularly at the Zone A fishing zone.
“The ministry received complaints on this issue every day. I’ve raised this issue numerous times in cabinet meetings. However, we do not have enough assets to monitor every inch of our territorial waters.
“Therefore, we are looking at training fishermen to be the eyes and ears of the government, in addition to the monitoring and enforcement that is being carried out by the authorities.”
He said this after launching the Fisheries Department’s excellence programme at the Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang here yesterday.
Salahuddin said although the proposal was discussed at the ministry level, its implementation required a detailed discussion with the Home Ministry, as it involved enforcement and national security.
He said MOA was looking at setting up an application for fishermen to sell their products online.
“The Fisheries Development Authority of Malaysia has an application that allows consumers to check and compare prices of marine products.
“We are looking at upgrading the application and allowing fisherman to sell their products via the application,” he said, adding that this could reduce the involvement of middlemen.
“We are discussing this with the Federal Agricultural Marketing Authority, which will develop the system.”