UNB, Chandpur :
The two-month ban on hilsa fishing — in the 70 km Padma-Meghna sanctuary area in Chandpur — imposed by the government to protect “jatka” (hilsa fry), will end at 12am tonight. With the ban lifted, fishermen are preparing to resume hilsa fishing.
Chandpur district has around 44,000 registered fishermen, and they will start fishing from Shatanal of Matlab Uttar upazila to Charbhairavi of Haimchar upazila.
However, fishermen have complained about the full implementation of the ban.
Majority of locals in Chandpur’s Padma-Meghna sanctuary area earn their living through fishing and farming.
After being unemployed for two months, fishermen have repaired their boats and nets in preparation for the resumption of fishing. Fishermen were seen busy repairing nets and boats in different areas of the district.
Some people come from different parts of the district just to repair nets at this time. However, fishermen fear that they will not get the expected amount of fish because fishermen from Munshiganj, Mohanpur, and Shariatpur areas kept catching jatka.
The fishing ban was not implemented properly, said Bahria area fisherman Shahjahan Khan.
Law enforcement needs to be tougher so that no fisherman can go to the river, he said.
The District Fisheries Officer, Golam Mehedi Hasan, said that the district and upazila task force continued to make every effort to implement the two-month ban to protect the national resource hilsa.
A total of 371 people were jailed from March 1 to April 28 for violating the law and were sentenced to various terms.
With a view to boost the production of hilsa, the government imposed the two-month ban on hilsa catching, selling, hoarding and transporting from March 1 till April 30. The Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock allocated 40 kg of rice for each registered fisherman during this ban period.
Hilsa has the highest contribution to the country’s fish production as the single fish species. Every year, the government imposes a two-month ban on catching, selling, hoarding and transporting hilsa to boost production.