DUNGUN, 14 Dec (Bernama) -- The Terengganu Fishermen's Association (Penentu) expressed concern about the widespread encroachment of Vietnamese fishing boats into the state's waters during this monsoon season.
Its chairman, Mat Yassin Mohamed said the foreign fishing boats seemed unafraid to intrude into state waters to catch marine products as they believed authorities' operations would decrease during bad weather and rough seas.
He said that they (foreign fishing boats) are also free to enter these waters as the number of local fishing boats is not high during the monsoon season.
Most foreign fishing boats that intruded into the state's waters were detected using the pair trawling method, which has long been banned in Malaysia.
"The use of pair trawls usually involves a radius of one kilometre to catch marine products, including immature ones, which further damages the marine ecosystem," he said when contacted today.
Mat Yassin said that the waters off Terengganu are a focus of foreign fishermen during this bad weather season because they have a high yield of marine life.
In this regard, he said authorities such as the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA), Marine Police Force, and the Department of Fisheries Malaysia were asked to increase monitoring to combat foreign fishermen's encroachment activities during the monsoon season.
He added that the action needed immediate attention because it was feared it would harm marine life in the future.
-- BERNAMA
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