Fisheries Department officials from East Godavari and Visakhapatnam districts have decided to conduct joint talks by the end of June, in a bid to resolve a long-pending tussle between mechanised boat operators of the two coastal districts over the fish landing facility at Visakhapatnam harbour. Kakinada-based mechanised boat operators met East Godavari Joint Director (Fisheries) P.V. Satyanarayana here on Monday, seeking the State government’s intervention to allow them to use the fish landing facility at Visakhapatnam harbour for landing of their boats and marketing their tuna catch. Over the past few years, the boat operators in Visakhapatnam have allegedly been restricting the East Godavari mechanised boats to land at the Visakhapatnam harbour, forcing the latter to return to their hometown of Kakinada for fish landing and marketing. In a representation submitted to the Joint Director, a group of mechanised boat operators led by Tummala Kondala Rao, Tummala Ramesh and E. Ramu stated that barely 10% of the boats engaged in tuna fishing prefer to land at the Visakhapatnam harbour. In East Godavari, nearly 450 boats are engaged in tuna fishing by venturing into the deep sea in the region stretching from Odisha to Tamil Nadu coasts. The East Godavari fishermen say that they would prefer to land at the Visakhapatnam harbour as the fish would no longer remain fresh after 10 days of fishing, particularly when they return from the Odisha coast. An estimated Rs. 1 lakh is spent on fuel and commodities during the 10-day fishing voyage, they said.
‘Joint talks’
“I have discussed the issue with my counterpart in Visakhapatnam. It has been decided to conduct joint talks by June-end by inviting boat operators from the two districts and arrive at a permanent solution,” Mr. Satyanarayana told The Hindu .
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