Traditional fishermen and coastal communities are confused and bewildered by the perlemoen ban, the Masifundise Development Trust said on Friday.
It was reacting to the Cabinet announcement on Thursday that all wild perlemoen harvesting will be suspended indefinitely from the end of this month.
”The announcement … has been met with confusion and bewilderment by traditional fishers and coastal communities throughout the Western Cape,” the NGO said in a statement.
The move has, however, been welcomed by environmental organisations.
Masifundise said it recognises perlemoen stocks are under serious threat of over-exploitation, but said to ”punish” traditional fishers for this is ”discriminatory, foolhardy and will most certainly backfire”.
The crisis in the fishery, including rampant poaching and associated social problems, is a product of past inequitable economic and social policies, it said.
Masifundise works with small-scale and traditional fishing and coastal communities along the Cape’s south and west coasts.
Environment and Tourism Affairs Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk’s office said on Friday that warnings the fishery might be closed were issued as far back as 2004.
In his budget speech earlier this year, the minister had again warned of a ban if stocks continued to head towards extinction, spokesperson Riaan Aucamp said.
”For the past few years the recommendation from our department’s managers and researchers has been that the fishery is in crisis and that the closure could not be avoided,” he said.
The total annual allowable catch of perlemoen, also known as abalone, has dropped rapidly over the years to the current 100 tonnes.
The Cabinet has said there will be an increase in policing to try to stop perlemoen poaching, which is widely blamed for the removal of thousands of tonnes of the expensive shellfish along the Cape coast and for the collapse of the sector. — Sapa