‘Old fish net collection centres to come up in 14 coastal districts’

Environment, Climate Change and Forests secretary Supriya Sahu on Wednesday said that the scheme to collect old fish nets was being expanded to the 14 coastal districts in the State.

This will be done under the TN-Shore project and the funding is also ready.

Speaking at the launch of the 100 beaches cleaning campaign by the M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) to mark the birth centenary celebrations of agricultural scientist Prof. M.S. Swaminathan, she said that the fish net collection centre at the Kasimedu fishing harbour had so far collected 35,000 kg of discarded and damaged nets at ₹40 a kg. “Imagine, we have prevented 35,000 kg of nets from entering the sea,” she pointed out. As next step, she said that the department had plans to collect thermocol boxes, which are the next largest discarded material.

‘Reuse plastic’

Chairperson of MSSRF and former Chief Scientist at the World Health Organisation Soumya Swaminathan, said that climate change was a major issue faced by everyone, especially fishermen. She urged fishermen to recycle, reuse and restrict the use of plastics as creatures including turtles, whales and sharks and smaller fish were harmed. 

She said that the Foundation was conducting clean-up programmes at 100 beaches over the week along with the HCL Foundation.

Chairperson of the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board M. Jayanthi and Assistant Director of Fisheries (Kasimedu harbour) Thirunageshwaran were present on the occasion.

Till September 23, around 5,000 fishermen, students, community members and volunteers will come together to clean 100 beaches in eight Indian coastal states, of Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha and Gujarat.