The Agriculture department said Monday major river basins and lakes will be seeded with fingerlings of indigenous and non-invasive fish species over the next five years in a program called Project Basil, which stands for “Balik Sigla sa Ilog at Lawa.”
The National Inland Fisheries Enhancement Program of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, an agency under the DA, was designed to provide Filipinos greater access to available food and address poverty and hunger in the countryside.
Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol said he has ordered the BFAR to design this program “because of my realization that rivers and lakes in the country no longer have the same amount of fish population as they had many years ago, when the use of chemicals in agriculture and illegal fishing methods like ‘electric fishing’ and cyanide was not widespread.”
“Overfishing and the use of illegal and destructive fishing methods have virtually decimated the indigenous fish species in the major lakes and rivers of the country,” Piñol said.
Piñol said Project Basil has identified seven major lakes and six major river basins all over the country as the initial areas targeted for the fingerlings seeding.
The biggest of the first group of major lakes is Laguna de Bay with 90,000 hectares, followed by Lake Lanao (34,700 hectares), Taal Lake (23,400 hectares), Lake Mainit in Surigao del Norte (17,300 hectares), Naujan Lake in Oriental Mindoro (11,000 hectares), Buluan Lake in Maguindanao (6,500 hectares) and Lake Sebu in South Cotabato (354 hectares).
The major rivers are in the Cagayan River Basin (2.5 million hectares), Mindanao River Basin (2.3 million hectares), Agusan River Basin (one million hectares), Pampanga River Basin (974,000 hectares) Abra River Basin (512,500 hectares) and Bicol River Basin (377,100 hectares).
Among the indigenous species to be seeded in the lakes and rivers are Ayungin, Biya, Kanduli, Martinique, the native catfish or Hito and the Black Head Eel or Igat.
Acceptable fish species, which are not considered threats to ecological balance in the lakes and rivers like tilapia and bangus, will also be introduced.
The local government units will handle the monitoring of fishing activities and in reporting the volume of the catch.
“By 2018, an estimated 26 million fingerlings will be seeded in the rivers and lakes and by the end of the term of President Rody Duterte, Project Basil targets to seed about 210 million fingerlings,” Piñol said.
Piñol said Project Basil will start in Laguna de Bay this year to address the expected shortage of fish supply in Metro Manila, owing to the dismantling of fish pens in the lake.
Local officials of towns, cities and provinces surrounding Laguna de Bay and other stakeholders will be invited by the DA to a forum before the end of this month for the presentation and validation of Project Basil.