LATAKIA, Syria (North Press) – It’s five in the morning, and it is raining heavily in the city of Latakia on the Syrian coast. Ahmed gets up from his bed quietly, and the silence around him is broken by the alarm ringing. He prepares a coffee pot, then pours it into a thermos to take with him to sea.
He says, “The sea without coffee, is like eating without salt – it has no taste.”
The fishing port of al-Nazha (breakwater, also known locally as the Yugoslav port), which got its name from the company that constructed it in the 1970s, is only about a kilometer away from Ahmed’s house. Ahmed graduated from the Economics Faculty and is an employee of the Finance Directorate in Latakia.
The man carries two fishing poles and a small bag containing special supplies, and immediately sits on the edge of the breakwater and throws his hook, waiting for a bite.
Ahmed is not a full-time fisherman, and he is not from a family of fishermen. Most of his brothers and sisters have been outside the country for decades, but he has been fishing every day until he became addicted to it, especially after his economic situation deteriorated severely.
He says, “The salary for the job is 50,000 Syrian pounds (SYP, or 20 USD). This barely covers the rent, while the salary of my wife, who is an engineer, is 50,000 SYP as well. And both salaries cover only a third of the expenses. We meet the rest of our needs with the fish we catch.”
The daily yield varies according to the season and luck, he says.
“Unfortunately, every day the yield is less than the day before. The cliffs, explosions, poisons, and electric shocks (electrofishing) has not left many creatures in the coastal waters.”
The number of people heading to the sea increased at a time when its resources are dwindling, but nevertheless, “The sea remains more generous than our government, at least it does not distribute the yields to us via a smart card,” Ahmed said.
Under siege and sharing the livelihood
“What is left of our profession? Can it even be called a profession? Fisherman Abu Khaled (a pseudonym) who relies on fishing for his livelihood, says.
He has five children and lives in the southern Raml region in Latakia. “Believe me, we convince ourselves to continue in a profession that is no longer ours, as everyone wants a piece of our little livelihood,” he explains.
He adds, “The fisherman does not take the entire yield to sell, so he must distribute a part of it to the Coast Guard, a part to the price control officer, and sometimes to others from the official authorities who are present in the port.”
Like Ahmed and Abu Khaled, other fishermen we interviewed exclusively said they were trying to convince themselves “to continue in the profession of their ancestors that they forged on the seas since ancient times.”
Their problems do not seem new. For more than three decades, no effective government plans have emerged that have benefited this vital sector in order to transform it from its old reality to the latest modernity that meets international standards.
Fishermen say that, on the contrary, the old fishing ethic that took into account the environment, fish, and the sea has been dismantled and turned into chaos that will “kill all hope left in the near future.”
Ibrahim (a pseudonym), a 55-year-old professional fisherman, said that chaos is still a title for fishing.
In most countries in the world, there is a period of prevention of fishing, which aims to protect fish and ensure their reproduction for the next season, assuming that it will be at the beginning of spring, the breeding season for most animals.
However, Ibrahim said that this period comes between July and August for them, as there is an old decision from the Supreme Council for Aquatic Life issued in 2009 which banned the seasonal fishing of migratory fish by bottom trawling during these two months.
The decision was issued with the aim of protecting Syrian fisheries, “but the fish defined in the decision are migratory fish and do not reside in the Syrian Sea, such as small sardines.”
Ibrahim says, “according to what I know from fishermen from neighboring countries, the state provides fishermen with salaries for a period of two or three months equal to the salaries of ordinary employees in their countries.”
In Turkey, for example, they pay fishermen salaries during the prohibition period equivalent to 100,000 SYP (40 USD), and this allows fishermen to both abide by the prohibition decision and meet the needs of his family from the expenses. “What is preventing our country from doing the same?” Ibrahim wonders.
No international aid for fishermen
Abu Muhammed, a driver at the Tobacco Agency who fishes part-time, said, “Throughout the years of the war, very few fishermen received aid from the Red Crescent; from what we heard there is international aid for fishermen, but we did not see any aid yet.”
The last time that international institutions provided aid was more than seven years ago, in light of a complete break in maritime relations with other countries and international institutions.
On the other hand, fishermen said that the old fishermen have abstained from the profession, and the fishery boss no longer appears frequently on the boats. According to the fishermen present, most of the sea fishermen, as they were called, abandoned the ancestral profession and sold their boats to other people, while some old people just fish for fun.
“For me, I sold my boat and opened a small grocery store where I sell food,” said Abu Hassan, an old fisherman from Latakia.
Nevertheless, Abu Hassan continues to come to the sea every week to have fun and communicate with the rest of his old friends.
Working at sea has become disgusting
The conditions of the country and the ten-year war have resulted in the weakness of the labor market in general, and the population searches for new sources of earnings, including heading to fishing as the easiest profession.
But the fisherman Zuhdi (a pseudonym), said, “Our problem is not increasing the number of fishermen, because the total number of all fishermen on the Syrian coast does not exceed three thousand people.”
Half of the amateur fishermen only come to the sea once a week. Only the boatmen are exposed to the sea “in its true sense, and spend twenty hours in various types weather, in search of money.”
Zuhdi said that they were prevented from accessing the territorial waters some time ago on the pretext that they were smuggling people, hashish, and other things, and although the authorities don’t trust them, the penalties for those who change their port are harsh and cannot be pardoned.”
The decisions tighten the screws on the poor fishermen instead of big merchants, according to the fisherman Abu Muhammad.
He said with a sigh, “It is strange that the ports and the competent authorities combat us, as if they are fighting us. All fishermen know who smuggles and transports hashish, grains, etc., in broad daylight.”
He added, “The official authorities know them, but they ignore them. The work in the sea has become tired and frankly disgusting, and on top of it, unproductive.”
Formal ports and unfair decisions
Officially, there are several small fishing ports in Latakia, the most famous of which is the fishing port of al-Nazha (the Yugoslav port), and it is located near the free zone, the Southern Kornish Port (Mina al-Qasab), Umm al-Tuyur, the port of Ras Ibn Hani and the port of al-Basit. The last two are difficult to name as ports, due to not being equipped with any means of protection from storms and waves such as piers.
The main port receives dozens of fishermen daily, but it suffers from the accumulation of garbage and the weakness of services that can be invested for the benefit of sea voyages, not to mention that access to it is restricted.
Fisherman Khaled says, “The area can be turned into a popular tourist site with a few services such as drinking water, selling stalls, cleaning, and barriers to prevent children from falling into the water, but no one thinks about that. And if we think about that, there will be those who make our work difficult with royalties and other things.”
The imposition of royalties is not a new matter for every business or project in the region. There are always multiple parties responsible for the same project, which causes multiple references for the same project, and the imposition of royalties comes as part of the system of corruption rooted in the country, according to many reports.
But the biggest problem is preventing fishermen from traveling between those ports. “If a fisherman is late for his return to the port, that is, if he stays at sea for more than 20 hours, he may be subject to detention and accountability for smuggling or cutting off regional waters,” Khaled said.
Worse still, a decision is issued to transfer the boat from one port to another, as it cannot return to its original port until years later, or after paying bribes through middlemen.
A fisherman who spoke on condition of anonymity said, “Three years have passed since I was in the Yugoslav Port, awaiting a decision to return me to al-Basit Port, but nothing happened. Despite all that it costs me in expenses and losses, the truth is that nepotism is the solution.”
According to the Fishermen’s Union, “the transfer process from one port to another is subject to circumstances.”
However, these circumstances are not legally clear, and are similar to the travel ban outside territorial waters that was issued in 2007, which aimed to prevent the smuggling of diesel and illegal immigrants.
The fisherman laughed and said, “Ok, the diesel is now on the smart card, and our allocations are already insufficient, especially in the winter season when consumption increases, and immigrants have land and sea routes through Turkey and not from our region, so why does this reality not change?”
Earlier, boats above 12 square meters, and travel groups that include five boats or more, were allowed to fish in the territorial waters on the condition that they be equipped with modern technical equipment, such as radar, depth probes, compasses, and navigational lights.
But the problem, according to Khaled, is that most of the boats are less than ten square meters, and the required equipment is very expensive (thousands of dollars).
Diesel is available for big merchants only
The total Syrian output of sea, river, and farmed fish until the year 2012 was about 12,000 tons, including all the Syrian geography, of which less than 3,000 tons was sea fish, according to previous statements by the Director of the General Fisheries Commission.
However, this amount decreased due to the war to less than half, which is confirmed by fishermen, and they said that the reason for this shortage is due to a number of factors, including the difficulty in obtaining fuel.
Abu Subhi, a fisherman and boat owner, said, “There are allocations for each boat that are determined according to the size of the boat and its engine capacity, and specific quantities are distributed after the implementation of the smart card system, but they are not sufficient, as it is only 400 liters, to cover fishing expenses as before.”
This reality forced many boat owners to refrain from going fishing, especially since the price of black market diesel is twice that of subsidized diesel.
This applies to a large number of boat fishermen, but only big merchants have the ability to obtain diesel at any time.
In addition to this, they are “able to engage in fishing by all available methods,” including illegal methods, such as bottom trawling and fishing with dynamite.
The big fish eat the small
Fishermen say that the proverb “the big fish eat the small” applies to them more than it does to fish. While some fish may survive being eaten, caught, or dynamited, the fishermen will not be able to survive in light of “the constant circumvention of fish market traders of prices.”
The process is being carried out by setting a ceiling for the price of fish that will not be exceeded no matter what, while it is sold for the benefit of restaurants and residents “at extravagant prices.”
The fishermen transport their produce to the fish market, which is known here as “the fish square” located in the Tabiyat neighborhood, where a merchant comes to assess the fish and weigh them, pays the money agreed upon with the fishermen, carries the fish in wooden boxes, and transfers them to various destinations, and what remains of it is sold to the residents.
According to semi-official figures, Latakia has about three thousand fishermen, half of whom are not registered with the Fishermen’s Union.
There are also about two thousand boats of various sizes and measurements, meaning that there are at least five thousand families linked to this sector.
Most fishermen believe that they are the missing link in planning any work related to them or their future, or even any official decision.