At present, the sea egg fishery is no longer commercially viable.
However, all Barbadians have an important role to play in recovery of this important
fishery.
For all of those who are involved in any way, either as a consumer or the fisherman, in
the illegal fishing of sea eggs, to desist from doing it, you're harming your fellow
Barbadians in many ways. You are actually, by your own actions, preventing them, preventing
everyone from benefiting, from getting any rewards out of the sea egg fishery.
It is going to take a change, positive change in attitudes and behavior in relation to sea
egg conservation and management. It will involve a lot of public education. I think the education
needs to reach a wider cross-section of the public. Barbadian society needs to realize
or needs to view illegal harvesting as a national outrage.
The public will be more sensitized to the destructive aspects of poaching, both at the
level of the consumers so that they would understand to stop facilitating it, stop promoting
poaching by buying illegal catches of sea eggs.
Ignorance is no excuse. People need to know when there is a close season, the period,
the flow season is for. They need to refuse to buy sea eggs during this time and I think
that that may have an impact on the amount of illegal harvesting that currently occurs.
In order for us to have our sea eggs and eat them too, we have to go about the right way
to manage them and the right way is to have everyone on board.
The only way for the sea egg stock to recover, no matter what we do, relies on compliance
with the sea egg fishing close season, not fishing stocks down to nothing and then continuing
to fish what little is left.
The fisheries educate me and tell me the reason why they shouldn't poach so I just stop poaching.
Now I know the dangers of poaching, I choose not to poach.
Police has a hotline set up, which is generally crime related. It matters if you don't have
to give your name. They can call that. The Marine Police, we also have our telephone
number or they can call it Coast Guard. There's normally three entities that would do the
thing.
And let's work together to do something great, to do something great for our future generations.
It is up to each and every one of us to play our part and bring Marbetus' sea egg fishery
back to its former thriving state.
