Lower water levels than previous years and illegal fishing are the main factors driving the reduction in the yield of fisheries lakes and rivers this year, said officials and key insiders.
Figures from the Fisheries Administration at the Ministry of Agriculture showed that the fisheries yield – freshwater fish, maritime fish, and farmed fish amounted to 856,400 tonnes, a year-on-year decrease of 8.5 percent.
The fisheries yield this year declined due to a number of factors, including climate change, and especially low water levels that made it impossible for fish to spawn in the numbers they had previously, Pum Sotha, director of the Fisheries Administration, said yesterday.
“The water levels in the Tonle Sap Lake and the Mekong River are low, with the effects of climate change exacerbating the reduction of water levels in lakes and rivers this year. This has caused a reduction in the size of the fish population, as well as the average size of each individual fish that was caught,” Sotha said.
The total tonnage of freshwater caught was 383,052, with maritime species yielding 125,000 tonnes. There were 348,348 tonnes of farmed fish harvested, according to the Fisheries Administration report.
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