Mike,
I'd suggest that in the future before making any statement you double check with your sources to make sure you are not misinforming the readers..
Mary,
As Peter said until ornamental fish collectors are licensed we won't have the real number. From our work with the Haribon Foundation we estimated that number between 4,000 and 4,500 The only way to know that is by traveling across the country and registrating each collector in each coastal community. It is just a project by itself.
Haribon/OVI projects trained 700 collectors. The other 200 hundred is an estimated we got of other collectors that were trained by trainers as an activity in the communities, it was trainers initiative to teach other collectors. Lack of incentive from the industry to pay more to collectors is one of the reasons why some of the trained collectors went back to cyanide. The anaylis presented by Peter about the actual number of fisherfolks offering net caught to the industry is the best information you can get.
I'd say that the number of collectors that need training is more than 2,000 considering the fact that some just quit fishing because many reasons (dangerous activity, activity that doesn't pay enough, no fish (overcollection)..etc). Other collectors need re-training as Peter just explained.
To complement to what I said in a previous post, I must said that the work done by organizations as the Haribon Foundation and OVI was oriented to educate fisherfolks in coastal communities about the environmental damage caused by the cyanide they were spreading to the coral heads when collectin fish. Our main objective was and is is to help to protect marine ecosystems in particular coral reefs. Our programs in the Philippines were not concentrated only and exclusively to train collectors to use nets instead of cyanide, we worked at community level on community organizing, environmental education, and alternative livelihoods.
The work of NGOs in the Philippines during the last 14 years has contributed in a considerable way to dimish the use of cyanide by fisherfolks collecting ornamentals for the aquarium industry. The situation in the Philippines is bad and it would be worse if we hadn't had people from NGOs contributing to do what has been done. The direct beneficiary of all the work done by NGOs during all those years are members of the industry, that includes many of the readers of this forum who bought and buy fish from the Philippines. That is great... but don't you think that is time to put something back? In the past, we didn't get any serious economic support from the industry to help the net training program. The only thing we got were applauses for a well done job. By then we didn't have the internet, or should I say, this kind of forums that can motivate, or the contrary(when the discussions are not serious enough) the readers to contribute to a good cause
Community organizing, capacity building, gender issues and alternative livelihoods are aspects that need attention when dealing with the cyanide issue in the PI and IN.
Gresham,
Ecovitality, got in contact with PMP. Howard visited the facility when it was near to close down. He was disappointed because he was expecting to see a multimillion dollar operation. They didn't get any fish from PMP.
Most of the buyers PMP had were from Europe and Canada.
Marillon
OVI is still active and is contributing the best the organization can to achieve the goals of organizations that such as MAC are working to find solutions to the problems the trade faces.. In Canada we have sources of funding that can be oriented towards initiatives tending to help coastal communities protecting at the same time the coral reef ecosystem.
Jaime Baquero
OVI
I'd suggest that in the future before making any statement you double check with your sources to make sure you are not misinforming the readers..
Mary,
As Peter said until ornamental fish collectors are licensed we won't have the real number. From our work with the Haribon Foundation we estimated that number between 4,000 and 4,500 The only way to know that is by traveling across the country and registrating each collector in each coastal community. It is just a project by itself.
Haribon/OVI projects trained 700 collectors. The other 200 hundred is an estimated we got of other collectors that were trained by trainers as an activity in the communities, it was trainers initiative to teach other collectors. Lack of incentive from the industry to pay more to collectors is one of the reasons why some of the trained collectors went back to cyanide. The anaylis presented by Peter about the actual number of fisherfolks offering net caught to the industry is the best information you can get.
I'd say that the number of collectors that need training is more than 2,000 considering the fact that some just quit fishing because many reasons (dangerous activity, activity that doesn't pay enough, no fish (overcollection)..etc). Other collectors need re-training as Peter just explained.
To complement to what I said in a previous post, I must said that the work done by organizations as the Haribon Foundation and OVI was oriented to educate fisherfolks in coastal communities about the environmental damage caused by the cyanide they were spreading to the coral heads when collectin fish. Our main objective was and is is to help to protect marine ecosystems in particular coral reefs. Our programs in the Philippines were not concentrated only and exclusively to train collectors to use nets instead of cyanide, we worked at community level on community organizing, environmental education, and alternative livelihoods.
The work of NGOs in the Philippines during the last 14 years has contributed in a considerable way to dimish the use of cyanide by fisherfolks collecting ornamentals for the aquarium industry. The situation in the Philippines is bad and it would be worse if we hadn't had people from NGOs contributing to do what has been done. The direct beneficiary of all the work done by NGOs during all those years are members of the industry, that includes many of the readers of this forum who bought and buy fish from the Philippines. That is great... but don't you think that is time to put something back? In the past, we didn't get any serious economic support from the industry to help the net training program. The only thing we got were applauses for a well done job. By then we didn't have the internet, or should I say, this kind of forums that can motivate, or the contrary(when the discussions are not serious enough) the readers to contribute to a good cause
Community organizing, capacity building, gender issues and alternative livelihoods are aspects that need attention when dealing with the cyanide issue in the PI and IN.
Gresham,
Ecovitality, got in contact with PMP. Howard visited the facility when it was near to close down. He was disappointed because he was expecting to see a multimillion dollar operation. They didn't get any fish from PMP.
Most of the buyers PMP had were from Europe and Canada.
Marillon
OVI is still active and is contributing the best the organization can to achieve the goals of organizations that such as MAC are working to find solutions to the problems the trade faces.. In Canada we have sources of funding that can be oriented towards initiatives tending to help coastal communities protecting at the same time the coral reef ecosystem.
Jaime Baquero
OVI
