Camotes Island

Camotes Sea is one of the major fishing grounds in Central Visayas. The once rich fishing ground -now started to deteriorate. Fishermen in Camotes have to travel several miles to the open ocean to catch enough fish in order to feed their family. Fishermen blamed the decline in fish catch to intrusion of commercial fishing vessels, dynamite fishing, cyanide fishing, fine mesh nets and compressor fishing.

To address the situation, the different towns in Camotes Island, San Francisco, Poro, Tudela and the town of Pilar established a marine sanctuary that will give time for the fish to grow and reproduce. In Pilar, they started with the establishment of marine reserves in different barangays, however, several issues came up including the difficulty in managing different small sanctuaries until only three out of the eight sanctuaries survive. But the municipality of Pilar did not give up. Pilar officials thought there’s a better way of doing things.

In January 2005, the Philippine Environmental Governance (EcoGov) Project, funded by USAID and implemented by DENR and other partners came to Pilar and assisted the establishment of a standard marine sanctuary which covers a large area, a “no-take zone” and legitimized by municipal ordinance. The new marine sanctuary covers “Taug” area and the existing marine sanctuary in Lower Poblacion surrounding the municipal wharf with a total area of 180 hectares, the largest in Camotes Island and one of the largest in Cebu province.

Although it’s too early to tell, but just recently, there’s several reports of increase in catch around the existing marine sanctuary in Lower Poblacion. In the next few weeks, I will personally visit the marine sanctuary of Pilar for a snorkeling activity with the sanctuary officials and see how they are progressing.

This is one of the greatest projects of the municipality of Pilar. Job well done to the Municipal Mayor of Pilar, Dr. Jet Fernandez and all the officials who actively supported this project, Mr. Dodong Maratas and the officials of barangay Lower Poblacion and Villahermosa who jointly managed and disseminate information to the people including sourcing out for financial and technical assistance, and most especially to the marine sanctuary wardens of Lower Poblacion who have been very active in law enforcement activities.

Source: Sanctuary officials and excerpt from the report of Miss Hazel O. Arceo - Central Visayas CRM Specialist / EcoGov

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