In strengthening and growing the fisheries sector into a full-fledged economic pillar, the Virgin Islands will soon engage the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (CEFAS) in the UK.
The Government of the Virgin Islands is steadily moving forward to make fishing a third economic pillar and sustainable sector in the Territory with the launch of the Fisheries Advisory Committee.
The Conservation and Fisheries Department is reminding the public, particularly the fishing and hospitality community that it is illegal to fish for, obtain or possess sea-turtle meat or bi-products.
An 18 month sea-bed mapping project and hydrographic survey on a specified 13.5 square miles (or 35 square kilometres) area off the coast of Tortola, was completed last month.
The Conservation and Fisheries Department is informing the public that the Virgin Expressions Talent Showcase slated for Saturday, October 24 has been cancelled.
Deputy Premier and Minister for Natural Resources and Labour, Dr. the Honourable Kedrick Pickering has denounced claims that there is wide spread fish kills in the Virgin Islands as a result of the Sargassum Seaweed.
Pelagic sargassum is a brown alga, or seaweed that floats free in the ocean and never attaches to the ocean floor. These free-floating forms are only found in the Atlantic Ocean. Sargassum provides refuge for migratory species and essential habitat for some 120 species of fish and more than 120 species of invertebrates. It’s an important nursery habitat that provides shelter and food for endangered species such as sea turtles and for commercially important species of fish such as tunas. There are two species of sargassum involved in the sargassum influx: Sargassum natans and Sargassum fluitans.
