Kenya’s
suspension of seafood trade with Somalia through the Indian Ocean
routes has not been lifted, and anyone caught engaging in the business
will be arrested and the fish confiscated and destroyed, according to a
Kenyan government official.
The county commissioner for the
fish-rich Lamu County in Kenya enforced the edict of the Kenyan
government when he destroyed nearly 12 metric tons of dried fish
smuggled from neighboring Somalia in mid-April in defiance of a
cross-border trade ban imposed in June 2019.
Kenya, which exports
an estimated 2.2 percent of its total national export volumes to
Somalia, earlier said the ban was necessary because trade through some
coastal routes, especially Lamu, was promoting smuggling, human
trafficking, and terrorism.
“Today we’re here destroying 761 bags
of dried fish which translates to 12 [metric tons] … We’ve seven
suspects in custody. We will ensure they’re prosecuted,” Macharia said,
the Daily Nation reported.
Both
Kenya and Somalia are members of the eight-member Intergovernmental
Authority on Development (IGAD), a multinational body on development and
environmental control, that has been developing a common fisheries
strategy among its member states. The other members of the
Djibouti-based organization are Ethiopia, Sudan, Eritrea, South Sudan,
Djibouti, and Uganda.
Previously, the eight countries had resolved
to promote fish production and regional cooperation in combating
illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing that has made marine
fisheries one of the leading illegally traded natural resources in
Africa. The African Development Bank had previously estimated the losses from illegal marine fisheries trade for the continent at USD 2.5 billion (EUR 2.3 billion) annually.
IGAD
has pledged to facilitate fish trade among them by “promoting fisheries
development through capacity building for all participants in the
fisheries value chains to ensure access of fish and fisheries products
to domestic, regional and international markets.”
Currently, IGAD countries have been fine-tuning
the organization’s Regional Fisheries and Aquaculture Strategy
(2016-2020) that provides opportunity for the members to “utilize the
fish resource sustainably especially in arid and semi-arid area[s]s to
combat food insecurity, malnutrition, build resilience and provide a
clear road map for the intervention to be undertaken in the area of
fisheries and aquaculture.”
But with Kenya imposing a ban on cross-border trade with Somalia and listing the transactions “an offense” the implementation of the first IGAD pillar on “agriculture development, natural resources management, and environment” that focuses on fisheries, could be delayed.
