Fishermen, co-op busted for undersized conch
Busting a boat full of illegal seafood is not nearly as sexy as a skiff packed with cocaine…but every day officers of the Conservation Compliance Unit cruise Belize’s waters to protect our marine resources. Today, they hit pay dirt. News 5’s Stewart Krohn reports.
Stewart Krohn, Reporting
It was a conch lovers dream…and whether you like the delectable shellfish stewed, fried, frittered or ceviched, it was enough to make your mouth water. Trouble is, every one of these two thousand, one hundred and sixty-six market cleaned conch is illegal, weighing in at well under the three ounce minimum. In big trouble is boat captain Nelson Garcia of Sarteneja, who along with his two sons, was busted early this morning outside the National Fishermen Cooperative.
Nelson Garcia
“What really happened, because all of we fishing together and I can’t know what everybody putting in their bag, right.”
Stewart Krohn
“These are your sons right?”
Nelson Garcia
“Yes.”
Stewart Krohn
“You never talk to your sons at all about what they ketch or that so much of what they ketch is undersize?”
Nelson Garcia
“Well me talk to them, but like everybody fishing in their own directions.”
Unfortunately, the direction of Garcia’s boat was directly into the waiting arms of fisheries officers.
Errol Diaz, Fisheries Inspector
“We have coordinators and intelligence from the C.C.U., which is the Conservation Compliance Unit of the Fisheries Department, the enforcement wing. And basically they do reconnaissance or surveillance and enforcement throughout Belize. And under good organisation and structure, they put together this catch that you see before you.”
Question:
“Is there any complicity on the part of the cooperative in this?”
Errol Diaz
“No, the cooperative had no dealings, they did not accept it, they actually rejected the product that came in. So it was actually catching them at entry, and the officers did a very good job.”
And according to Fisheries Inspector Errol Diaz, with a potential fine of between twenty and thirty dollars for each conch, the pain for Garcia could be excruciating.
Errol Diaz
“We plan to prosecute to the full extent of the law.”
Stewart Krohn
“Judging from the number of what you claim are undersized conchs, the full extent of the law would probably make this fisherman bankrupt.”
Errol Diaz
“That would be up to the Magistrate.”
As for the National Fishermen Cooperative, they fortunately rejected the member’s shipment. Co-op chairman Charles Heusner says that taking immature conch makes no sense.
Charles Heusner, Chairman, Nat’l Fishermen’s Cooperative
“This is a resource that needs the juveniles to support and industry. And if the fishermen they go out there and just harvest whatever is available, then sooner or later we won’t have that resource to harvest.”
But while Heusner applauds conservation, he believes that competition for the catch presents some special problems for conch.
Charles Heusner
“The lobster fisherman, they comply with the law. The only problem we have is with this conch. And why we have this problem is because the other society up the river is receiving the undersize. Because this is a problem that we have been trying to get at for quite a while now.”
Stewart Krohn
“That’s a serious allegation you’re making here Mr. Heusner.”
Charles Heusner
“Yes, it’s an allegation; it’s a fact also, because we know.”
And it appears that Heusner was not the only one who knew. Because no sooner had the officers sent the Garcia family off to court, they went up the street to the Northern Fishermen Co-op, where according to Errol Diaz, the haul was only slightly less impressive.
Errol Diaz
“The Conservation Compliance Unit upon searching the Northern Cooperative, found sixteen hundred and sixty-three undersize conch already in a basket, ready for processing inside of the cooperative.”
But a cooperative is not the same as a flesh and blood fisherman, so how do you arrest a corporation?
Stewart Krohn
“Now at that time, what did officials of the cooperative do when you essentially removed conch from their premises?”
Errol Diaz
“Initially earlier they wouldn’t allow officers inside, but fisheries officers are empowered under the fisheries ordinance to search, seize any boat, vessel or any institution dealing with fish and the sale of fish and so forth.”
Stewart Krohn
“Now just very recently after you seized the conch from Northern Fishermen Cooperative, Mr. Bradley, the production manager of the cooperative flatly informed us that no fisheries officers visited Northern Cooperative, he doesn’t know about any prosecution, what’s going on here?”
Errol Diaz
“I clearly couldn’t explain it to you any better than how you stated it. I don’t know what’s going on with that, I know that the officers involved blatantly counted them out one by one inside the cooperative. The product is here, it was brought by the officers that were working together, all members of the C.C.U. team. We’re just administering the law, all we do is bring out cases before the court and everything else from there is up to the court.”
Stewart Krohn for News 5.
Charged in the first bust were Nelson Garcia, Senior and Junior, along with Paulino Garcia. A cook aboard the vessel was not charged. In case you were wondering what happens to all that conch, it will be frozen until the trial date and then, according to fisheries officials, will be distributed to various charitable or public institutions.
