By Patience Harawa

Karonga, February 26, Mana: Karonga District fisheries office has hailed the Sustainable Fisheries Aquaculture Development and Watershed Management project (SFAD-WM) for promoting best fisheries management practices and enforcement of fishing laws and regulations in the district.

District fisheries officer for Karonga, Trasicio Ngulube said this on Tuesday in Karonga during a documentation exercise targeting activities that have been implemented under the SFAD-WM project.

Ngulube said; "The SFAD-WM project has been instrumental in ensuring that many fishing communities are properly registered and that their fishing tools are certified and licensed by the fisheries department.

“The project helped us to conduct land, and water patrols as part of enforcement of fishing laws and regulations in ensuring that all fishing communities have their fishing gears licensed. All unlicensed fish gears were confiscated.”

He further said through the resources provided under the project, over six fishponds that were destroyed by floods have been rehabilitated which has helped fish farmers to maximize fish harvest.

Ngulube said the project has also promoted fisheries management and preservation of sanctuaries including the establishment of Beach Village Committees (BVC) which have been instrumental in protecting breeding areas for fish.

“Before the project’s intervention, the districts fish stocks were low due to poorly protected breeding areas, however with the projects support the district has seen improvements in fisheries management and conservation,” he explained.

In his remarks, Deputy Director in the department of land and resource conservation McPherson Nthara hailed the success of the SFAD-WM project in conserving catchments and promoting sustainable fisheries.

“We have been working with SFAD-WM for the last two years to enhance the protection of catchment areas which have been degraded due to soil erosion, loss of vegetation and gully formation,” said Nthara.

He added that under the project, several catchment areas’ conservation interventions have been implemented such as construction of check dams, water harvesting, infiltration ponds, and tree planting among others.

Village head man Chakwela applauded the SFAD-WM project implementation strategy which he said encouraged the active participation of local communities in the implementation of various project activities.

He said the involvement of local communities in the implementation of project activities will help in the sustenance of project achievements even after donor support has been exhausted.

The Sustainable Capture Fisheries, Aquaculture Development and Watershed Management Project (SFADWMP) is a government of Malawi project which is being financed by the African Development Bank (AfDP).

The overall strategic objective of the project is to increase fish production in order to contribute to the well-being of Malawians, improve on food security and nutrition sensitive diets, reduce on poverty levels through employment opportunities and enhance adaptive capacity of value chain enterprises.