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K.G. Kumar

Recent events seem to indicate that the Kerala Government is taking an extra interest in development of its coastal regions.

Close on the heels of the announcement of clearance from the Defence Ministry for the transhipment terminal at Vizhinjam port off Thiruvananthapuram, Fisheries Minister S. Sarma announced last week that funds would be mobilised for implementing the St ate government’s Integrated Coastal Area Development Project (ICADP) for coastal villages.

The Minister told a press meet in Kannur that the project aimed to address the backwardness of the coastal region and raise the living standards of fishing communities by providing housing, sanitation, drinking water and electricity.

An estimated Rs 3,000 crore of funds will be raised from financial agencies and State and Central Government allocations.

The National Institute of Rural Development (NIRD), Hyderabad, has prepared a report for 222 villages in 102 local bodies in the State. In the initial phase, 27 fisheries villages of Kannur and Kasaragod were studied by the NIRD.

According to the Minister, the expected cost for the development of 11 fisheries villages in Kannur is Rs 103 crore, while it is Rs.139 crore in Kasaragod.

Funds will come from various sources, including local bodies, to the tune of Rs 11 crore for Kannur and nearly Rs 16 crore for Kasaragod. The rest, the Minister hopes, can be raised from the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) and the National Co-operative Development Corporation (NCDC).

To this will be added budgetary support from the State government and various Central government schemes. The Minister also said that the foundation stone for a fishing net manufacturing unit would be laid in Kannur in a few months and the factory will be commissioned in February.

This sudden buzz of activity along Kerala’s coast – normally throbbing only to the rhythms of fisherfolk, fishing nets and boats – may appear like a welcome bonanza for “backward” regions. But the reality for those living in the coastal areas of Kerala – mostly fishermen and their families – is one of harsh living conditions, which cannot be transformed overnight by the magic application of an industrial coating.

All over India, as State Governments seek to attract investments, fishing communities are being displaced from the coastal spaces they have occupied, to make way for tourism projects, ports, intensive aquaculture, airports, special economic zones (SEZs), and conservation initiatives.

These were the issues that the National Fishworkers’ Forum (NFF), a trade union of India’s small-scale and artisanal fishers, highlighted in a national campaign around the slogan “Save the Coast, Save the Fishers”.

The immediate provocation was the recommendation by the M.S. Swaminathan Committee, constituted by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, to ‘review’ the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Notification of 1991, which was intended to protect India’s coastal zone from destructive activities.

The Committee recommended a Coastal Management Zone (CMZ) Notification to replace the CRZ norms. Despite several inadequacies in the CRZ Notification, according to the NFF, traditional fishing communities regard it as one of the very few ‘good things’ that has happened to them. The NFF thinks that the proposed CMZ Notification dilutes the prohibitory character of the CRZ Notification.

Even as official efforts to develop Kerala’s coastal regions continue, these issues of the livelihood of fishing and coastal communities should not be confined to the footnotes of developmental history. The coastal communities of Kerala deserve a future in which their voices will be heard.

The writer can be contacted at kgkumar@gmail.com

More Stories on : Aquaculture | Kerala | Random Walk

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