July 07, Colombo: Sri Lanka government is planning to buy back the surplus boats which have been distributed among the fisher folks after the tsunami disaster. Ministry of Fisheries is now collecting information on these excess boats.
There are many fibre glass day boats which are not used and lying idle in beaches. These boats are not in use because of the lack of skilled fishermen to work in them, due to operational losses caused by the government's restrictions such as high security zones and due to the lack of fishing gear. In some cases the boats have been received by non fishermen who do not have the fishing skills.
Many non governmental organizations also have distributed boats and some of them are not suitable for sea fishing due to the poor quality of them.
About 5000 fishermen lost their lives and tens of thousands of fisher families were made homeless due to the tsunami on 26th December 2004. According to government estimates, 54% of the country’s fishing fleet was totally destroyed by the tsunami.
