Boat owners not to press for facility

Boat owners not to press for facility
HERALD REPORTER
MARGAO, AUG 31
Maintaining that a fish meal plant would have solved many a problem of the mechanized fishing industry, the Cutbona Boat Owners Union, however, said the boat owners will not press for the fish meal plant at Cutbona if the villagers of Velim and Ambelim are opposed to the project.
Allaying apprehensions of the villagers on the fish meal plant, the boat owners offered to meet the villagers along with the Fisheries Minister Joaquim Alemao and Director of Fisheries to reassure them the fish meal project will not take place against their wishes.
A boat owner Patrick Cardozo said that the boat owners would not mind if the government drops the fish meal project, but appealed to the government to set up ice plant, parking, workshop and other facilities at the jetty to meet the requirements
Boat Owner Roosevelt Alemao said the boat owners will soon have a joint meeting with the agitating villages to reassured the people that they will not demand a fish meal plant against their wishes.
He said the fisheries Minister and the Director of Fisheries  will meet the village to allay apprehensions on the land acquisition process.
Another boat owner John Barretto said the boat owners have been carrying out the fishing activity from the Cutbona jetty with the support and cooperation of the local villagers. “Around 300 mechanised fishing boats operate from Cutbona. The owners are all Goans, while 50 per cent of the boat owners hail from Velim, Ambelim and Betul. The industry supports around 500 families, while around 50,000 are directly or indirectly depend on their livelihood on the fishing industry”, he added.
Barretto said the mechanized boat owners have been facing difficulties in the drying of fishing and to dispose of excess fish catch in recent times. “We were first drying the fish at Zuari and the activity was later shifted to the Verna plateau, which was stopped after the setting up of the industrial estate. Fish drying has been stopped at the Naqueri plateau after the land was acquired for the food park. Where are going to dry the fish or dispose off the excess cash. On the one hand, villagers stop trucks transporting fish across the border, while they are opposed to the setting up a fish meal plant at the jetty”, he said.
“We need a fish meal plant, but let the government give us an alternative place if the project at Cutbona is scrapped”, he demanded.
The boat owners contended that land admeasuring 30,000 square meters is required at the fishing jetty to provide infrastructure such as a ice plant, vehicular parking, storage etc
Patrick said that fish meal plants set up at Mumbai, Gujarat and other states along the west coast would show they are non-polluting.