Post Courier
Papua New Guinea's 'trupla' leading Daily Newspaper Since 1969.The Post-Courier is proud of its record as the voice of PNG. We were there when the nation took its first bold steps towards independence. Since that time, we have fearlessly recorded the nation's progress.
The government must intervene to save thousands of jobs and to investigate the two fishing processing factories in the country, Member for Vanimo-Green Belden Namah said.
Mr Namah is calling on the government for a swift and urgent intervention to protect the 5000 workers laid off at the Majestic Seafood processing plants in Lae due to ‘lack of fish’.
Earlier this year, it was reported that RD Tuna in Madang also laid off hundreds of workers at its processing plant for the same reason.
Both Majestic Seafood and RD Tuna are foreign owned companies given license to operate in the country.
“I’m very concerned that thousands of workers are being laid off and left with no form of income to support their families, particularly at this time of great economic hardship.
“The excuse being given by the companies is that there is lack of fish, or the access fee charged under the Vessel Day Scheme (VDS) was too high, therefore, workers are being laid off and production scaled back.
“This is not good enough. The companies seen to be making excuses to return to the old days when they fish in our waters for free and shipped all the fish for processing in Thailand or the Philippines, creating employment, export earnings, and tax revenue in those countries rather than in PNG, where the fish is caught.
“We cannot allow our resources to benefit the economy of other countries. The government must put its foot down and be firm, ” Mr Namah said.
He said the government’s emphasis on downstream processing for our natural resources was the right way to go to grow and make the economy more resilient.
“The fisheries sector has six processing plants in the country employing thousands of Papua New Guineas, almost half of whom are women and girls.
“The onshore processing of tuna by these factories provide employment, bring export earning into the country, provide spin off business opportunism in the localities they operate in and provide revenue to the government through taxes.
“We should be looking at ways, working with the operators, to ensure these processing plants operate at full capacity so the benefits are increased to optimum level.”
Mr Namah said some of the difficulties the operators were complaining about was already being offered through the financial incentives in the production rebates scheme introduced in 2017, where they receive US$400 for every metric tonne of fish processed in their plants.
That is a dangerous incentive. On top of that, the National Fisheries Authority has announced a 30 per cent discount in access fees (VDS) for boats fishing in our archipelago waters and economi exclusive zone (EEZ), to offset rise in fuel and other costs.
“If these boats are connected to the processing plants here, then they are receiving double incentive. Therefore, there should be no workers laid off. Instead we should be seeing more workers being employed in the processing facilities.
“Foreign operators who do not want to abide by our rules and do not accept the very generous incentives already offered, then must let them go and be prepared to buy them out and take over the fishing and processing facilities,” Mr Namah said.
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