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By Anosh Malekar The Ministry of Environment and Forests has agreed to drop the proposal to replace the current Coastal Regulation Zone notification with a controversial Coastal Management Zone notification. Minister Jairam Ramesh conveyed this to a delegation of the National Fishworkers Forum that met him in Delhi recently
 Fishermen feared their livelihood would be jeopardised if CMZ notification became law A fresh set of rules is in the offing to preserve India’s 7,517 km coastline, with Minister for Environment and Forests (MoEF) Jairam Ramesh assuring a delegation of fishermen in New Delhi on July 2, 2009, that the controversial Coastal Management Zone (CMZ) notification – vociferously opposed by small fishermen all along the nation’s winding coastline – will be allowed to lapse. The fishermen and their organisations, who feared their traditional livelihoods would have been jeopardised if the draft notification became law, had been up in arms for nearly a year during which they undertook a marathon Kutch-Kolkata March along the entire coast followed by an agitation in the national capital last year to press a charter of their demands. There are around 3200 fishing villages along the vast coastline of India, with over 3 million people directly involved in fishing and another 3 million working in the ancillary industries. The fishermen's main objection to the draft of the CMZ notification of 2008, largely based on a report by eminent agricultural scientist and the pioneer of the Green Revolution in India, MS Swaminathan, was that it would displace their settlements along the beaches and halt traditional fishing near the coast. National Fishworkers Forum (NFF) chairperson Harekrishna Debnath said the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) of 1991 had at least tried to find the balance, however pretentious or flawed its enforcement might have been, between protecting the coasts and making provisions for the needs of coastal communities. But the CMZ notification did not even pretend to do so and even legitimised encroachments by corporate groups and government agencies. The CMZ notification specified that all coastal panchayats with a population density of over 400 people per square kilometer would be thrown open for unbridled development such as SEZs and notified tourism areas, subject only to an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and an assessment by the local body. Members of the NFF and Kerala Swatantra Matsya Thozhilali Federation (Kerala Independent Fishworkers Federation) said that Ramesh had now promised “to let the CMZ notification lapse”. The minister further assured the delegation that the existing CRZ notification would not be changed without consulting them. Ramesh, NFF said in a press statement, told the delegation that within two months his ministry would hold five sessions with fishermen to discuss improvements in the CRZ notification of 1991. These sessions would be held at Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Mumbai and somewhere in Kerala and Goa, in collaboration with the NFF. A top official in the ministry of environment and forests confirmed on July 6 that the process of making fresh rules to save India's coastline will take off soon. “Unless the Union government acts on it, the draft CMZ notification will lapse on July 22. The government plans to let it lapse,” the official said on condition of anonymity. Leo F Saldanha of the Bangalore-based Environment Support Group, an NGO that helps the fishermen’s cause, is reported to have said the minister had "confirmed that the reform process would not interfere with the traditional and customary rights of fishing communities. In fact, precautionary measures would be taken to ensure the protection of traditional fishing people, their livelihoods and the coast". Thomas Kocherry, Executive Committee Member of NFF, said that the NFF has also sought the intervention of the MoEF in the issue of the Jambudweep fishermen displaced by the unfair implementation of the Forest Protection Act and the imposition of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) without consulting the fishermen. In 2002, the Supreme Court of India had ordered the eviction of the island, a part of Sunderbans biosphere reserve in West Bengal customarily used by about 10,000 fishermen as their temporary base from October to February to catch and dry fish, to make way for an eco tourism project sanctioned by the West Bengal government to the Sahara India Group.  NFF has agreed to consultations on revamping CRZ without by-passing concerns of fishworkers The delegation insisted on the MoEF implementing the recommendations of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science & Technology, Environment & Forests headed by Rajya Sabha MP Dr V Maitreyan, which submitted its report to parliament on March 20, 2009. The standing committee has recommended an elaborate consultation with the fishing communities as a precondition for any legislation or regulation by the MoEF. It has also recommended a comprehensive legislation (on the lines of the Forest Rights Act) that protects the rights of the fishing communities rather than the issue of a mere notification by the MoEF. The Parliamentary Standing Committee has clearly stated the following: * One of the greatest apprehensions about the CMZ Notification was that it proposes legalisation and encouragement to industrial corporate activities along the coasts in the garb of management methodologies. It was widely apprehended that this Notification will significantly curtail the accessibility of the local community to the shore and sea resources and serve the economic interests of the corporate sector/large investors like tourism industry, refinery, mining etc. * In a democratic country like ours the preferred approach should be bottom-up – focusing on public participation in planning and development -- rather than top-down, where decisions are made by the government, not involving people in inclusive growth opportunities and practices in matters which have far-reaching consequences on a vast population solely dependent on their tradition vocations and way of life. NFF, in its press statement, said it understands this round of negotiations on key issues as a success of its organisational strength and legitimacy of its demands. “However, it believes that the process will be ongoing and at every point, NFF will raise the voice and concerns of the traditional fishworkers of India. While NFF has agreed to be part of the consultations by MoEF towards improving CRZ mandate, it is clear that quality community participation in good strength alone can make sure that the concerns of fishworkers are not by-passed”. Earlier, the NFF delegation met with the President of India, ministers of agriculture, environment, labour and home, MPs of coastal states, key officials and representatives of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), according to a press note issued by Kocherry. Besides scrapping of the new CMZ notification, the fishermen’s other important demands include enactment of a comprehensive legislation to regulate fishing in India’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), the ratification of the ILO’s “work in fishing” convention and the waiver of the debts of fishermen and fisherwomen on the lines of the debt waiver granted to farmers. The NFF delegation was assured by Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and Minister of State Prof K V Thomas that the ministry has agreed to consider the waiver of bank loans for small-scale traditional fishermen and women. The ministry has sought more details on the bank loans provided by banks to small fishworkers. The delegation met President Pratiba Patil and presented to her the demand to set up a separate ministry for fisheries, in view of the fact that decision-making affecting the fisheries sector and fishing communities are currently spread over a number of ministries and departments. Fishermen maintain the lack of protection of the Indian coast is largely a result of weak implementation by the central and state governments of the 1991 CRZ notification and also its repeated dilution. In 1991 the government had banned a number of ecologically destructive activities along the coast. But the CRZ notification was amended repeatedly, some 25 times, and policymakers admit it is now a mess. According to the environment ministry official, the government now proposes to protect the ecology of the Indian coast through a three-pronged strategy: * For Lakshadweep and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, the government is going to notify a separate Island Protection Zone that combines CRZ-91 and the scientific principles of the CMZ-08 notification. * The government will look at "critical vulnerable areas" like the Sundarbans separately. * For the rest, CRZ-91 will be used as a framework and the government will see where changes have to be made. Infochange News & Features, July 2009
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