{"id":232672,"date":"2022-07-28T19:36:23","date_gmt":"2022-07-28T17:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/article\/western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-over\/"},"modified":"2022-07-28T19:36:23","modified_gmt":"2022-07-28T17:36:23","slug":"western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-all-over-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-all-over-again\/","title":{"rendered":"Western Cape fishers want rights allocation process to be started all over again"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"article_body\">\n<p><a class=\"bigger-image\" href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/media\/uploads\/images\/photographers\/Ashraf%20Hendricks\/fishersnicole-ashrafhendricks-20220728-20220722-img_7634hr.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-all-over-again.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\">Unsuccessful applicant Nicolette Weitsz wants the fishing rights allocation process scrapped and restarted. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p class=\"intro\">Fishers and owners of small fishing companies have called for the fishing rights allocation process to be scrapped and started again.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p class=\"intro\">They say they are at a disadvantage with respect to bigger companies.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p class=\"intro\">At meetings in the Western Cape over the last week, fishers from Kalk Bay, Saldanha Bay, Hawston and Mossel Bay complained about the process used to allocate rights to fish various species for 15 years at a time.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p class=\"intro\">The 2021-22 application process is over and unsuccessful applicants have until Friday 29 July to appeal.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Fishers on the West Coast and in Cape Town have called for the Fishing Rights Allocation Process (FRAP) to be scrapped and restarted, after many failed to get 15-year fishing rights.<\/p>\n<p>Over the last week, meetings have been held with fishers in Kalk Bay, Saldanha Bay, Hawston and Mossel Bay, convened by ANC leader in the provincial legislature Cameron Dugmore and other officials. Dugmore said the meetings had been called after numerous complaints from fishers whose rights applications had not been approved for FRAP 2021-22. Some were previously rights holders and some were new entrants.<\/p>\n<p>Dugmore said the fishers\u2019 concerns would be sent to Barbara Creecy, Minister of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment.<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt class=\"leave\" height=\"1\" id=\"gu_counter\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-all-over-again.gif\" width=\"1\"><\/p>\n<p>Several fishers at the meetings in Kalk Bay and Saldanha Bay called for the whole process to be scrapped and restarted. Many also raised concerns about the high costs of applying. Others said coastal communities who had fished for generations were not sufficiently taken into account.<\/p>\n<p>Applicants have until 29 July to submit appeals if they were unsuccessful.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a very serious issue,\u201d said Dugmore. \u201cIf you are not successful, it means for the next 15 years you don\u2019t have fishing rights.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Dugmore said very \u201cbig and established companies\u201d did not seem to be complaining but smaller companies and fishers had raised many concerns. He said that the minister had no choice but to set aside the current application process.<\/p>\n<p>Unsuccessful applicant Nicolette Weitsz said during the meeting in Kalk Bay that fishers were charged \u201castronomical fees\u201d. For instance, in the category Hake Deep Sea, the application fee was R40,000. Only two entirely new entrants were successful. Weitsz said fishers should have been told that only a limited number of applicants would be awarded rights. In the category of squid, for instance, no new rights were awarded.<\/p>\n<p>Weitsz also said applicants had not been sent all the information on their unsuccessful applications which they would need in order to appeal.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFRAP should be scrapped and restarted,\u201d said Weitsz. She said current rights holders and successful new applicants should be allowed to finish the year, and next year the process should be done again properly. \u201cThere are a lot of people\u2019s livelihoods at stake,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Elmondo Paulse, a fisher from Saldanha Bay, said the high fees were designed to exclude the smaller companies from applying. \u201cSome of these small-scale fishers had to borrow money to submit an application. Now they\u2019re in debt again,\u201d he said, noting that each application was non-refundable.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you\u2019re unsuccessful, tough luck, you lose your money,\u201d said Paulse.<\/p>\n<p>Jacobus Poggenpoel, who says his family has been fishing in Kalk Bay for more than 100 years and was a previous FRAP rights holder, agreed that the process should be scrapped. He used to hold rights for pilchards and anchovies, and for hake longline fishing, but has been unsuccessful this time.<\/p>\n<p>Poggenpoel said that the application process was designed for bigger companies. \u201cHow can the smaller companies go up against the big companies?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n<p>GroundUp <a href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/article\/we-get-left-out-of-the-picture-so-the-bigger-fish-can-survive-says-hout-bay-fisher\/\">reported<\/a> in April complaints by Hout Bay fishers that most rights had been handed to bigger companies.<\/p>\n<p>Spokesperson for the Department of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment Albi Modise said the department was aware of the concerns and unsuccessful applicants were encouraged to appeal. He said it was \u201cpremature\u201d for the department to comment on the process until the Minister had considered the appeals. He said there had been technical errors with the online application system, but these had been fixed and the department had extended the application deadline to make up for this.<\/p>\n<p>Modise said that 551 appeals had been lodged so far. \u201cIt is expected that the number will increase as the appeals period is still currently underway\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"article_copyright\">\n<p>\u00a9 2022 GroundUp. This article is licensed under a <a href=\"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/4.0\/\" rel=\"license\">Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and GroundUp, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.<\/p>\n<p>We put an invisible pixel in the article so that we can count traffic to republishers. All analytics tools are solely on our servers. We do not give our logs to any third party. Logs are deleted after two weeks. We do not use any IP address identifying information except to count regional traffic. We are solely interested in counting hits, <b>not tracking<\/b> users. If you republish, please do not delete the invisible pixel.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-all-over-again.jpg\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/\">Source: GroundUp<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Unsuccessful applicant Nicolette Weitsz wants the fishing rights allocation process scrapped and restarted. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks Fishers and owners of small fishing companies have called for the fishing rights allocation process to be scrapped and started again. They say they are at a disadvantage with respect to bigger companies. At meetings in the Western Cape [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":232673,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9928],"tags":[28001],"class_list":{"0":"post-232672","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-groundup","8":"tag-groundup","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/western-cape-fishers-want-rights-allocation-process-to-be-started-all-over-again.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}