Aleem Khan

Fish­er­men in T&T re­ceived over $77.3 mil­lion in pay­ments as com­pen­sa­tion for seis­mic ac­tiv­i­ty from five oil com­pa­nies be­tween 2010 and 2013, the Min­istry of En­er­gy re­port­ed yes­ter­day.The min­istry re­leased the in­for­ma­tion hours af­ter dozens of fish­er­men from across Trinidad staged a demon­stra­tion in down­town Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day to vent their anger at the im­pact that seis­mic sur­veys have had on fish stock.The protest took place near the Min­istry of En­er­gy, Wa­ter­front Com­plex.Ac­cord­ing to the Min­istry of En­er­gy doc­u­ment, Cen­tri­ca, Niko Re­sources, BGTT, bpTT and Rep­sol forked out $7,008,000 in 2010; $26,896,949 in 2011; $29,025,260.83 in 2012 and $14,375,986.44 in 2013. That to­tals $77,306,196.27 for the four-year pe­ri­od.The Busi­ness Guardian re­port­ed in its Sep­tem­ber 27, 2012 edi­tion that when oil com­pa­nies con­duct­ed seis­mic op­er­a­tions off­shore, they usu­al­ly com­pen­sat­ed fish­er­men for lost catch and to stay away from their in­stal­la­tions.T&T's largest oil and gas pro­duc­er, bpTT, said in the ar­ti­cle they paid about $8,545 a month a boat to the fish­er­folk dur­ing the seis­mic pe­ri­od.

The lead­ers of as­so­ci­a­tions of fish­er­folk, quot­ed in the Busi­ness Guardian ar­ti­cle, said the seis­mic sur­veys scared away the fish and dam­aged the seabed.The com­pa­nies re­port these fig­ures to the min­istry to re­coup part of it and ben­e­fit from tax in­cen­tives on cap­i­tal ex­pen­di­ture.Com­pen­sato­ry pay­ments to fish­er­men for the loss of earn­ings as a re­sult of seis­mic ac­tiv­i­ty were con­firmed by Pe­ter Glodon, the pres­i­dent of the T&T Uni­fied Fish­er Folk (TUFF) and the vice- pres­i­dent of the or­gan­i­sa­tion, Kishore Boodram, both of whom par­tic­i­pat­ed in yes­ter­day's demon­stra­tion.

At the protest, some fish­er­men held plac­ards and protest­ed on the board­walk while ap­prox­i­mate­ly 50 fish­ing ves­sels gath­ered in the har­bour.Fish­er­men from Co­corite and Sea Lots and as far as Ica­cos, Ce­dros and Blan­chisseuse took part.The fish­er­men on the boats used bull­horns, flags and oth­er meth­ods to get the at­ten­tion of spec­ta­tors who gath­ered on the shore to watch the spec­ta­cle.In an in­ter­view at the protest, Boodram, who is al­so the pres­i­dent of the Clax­ton Bay Fish­ing As­so­ci­a­tion, said fish­ing stock had been de­plet­ed by seis­mic sur­veys be­ing done in lo­cal wa­ters.The sur­veys use re­flect­ed sound waves to de­ter­mine suit­able sites for un­der­wa­ter drilling and ex­plo­ration.They are said to dis­turb and dis­tress ma­rine life, es­pe­cial­ly cetaceans, such as whales, por­pois­es and dol­phins.Petrotrin an­nounced last week it would be do­ing sur­veys for five months, start­ing in De­cem­ber.

Boodram said: "It is time to stop, 'cause it has an im­pact on the liveli­hood of fish­er­men. Every day it is de­plet­ing more. We have them pound­ing on the seabed and in hatch­ery ar­eas."What will hap­pen? The fish stock will die and it is so bad that it has col­lapsed al­ready. The hearts of fish­er­men are bur­dened so we can't take any more."Boodram said the hatch­ing ar­eas and man­groves were be­ing "at­tacked" and the sur­veys pre­vent­ed wildlife from sur­viv­ing or pro­cre­at­ing."They need to find an­oth­er method be­cause this has an im­pact on the in­dus­try. Our chil­dren have to live," he said.He said that had been a prob­lem for tur­tles com­ing in to lay their eggs, dol­phins and fish. In ad­di­tion to the seis­mic sur­veys, trawlers, pol­lu­tion and pira­cy have de­plet­ed the fish­ing stock.

He added: "We wrote to sev­er­al min­is­ters. Pira­cy is al­so an­oth­er is­sue. We can't live with that. Every day fish­er­men go out there, they risk their lives."Oil and gas will fin­ish but this was the first sec­tor in T&T. They are treat­ing us like va­grants and we are will­ing to work." Sec­re­tary of Fish­er­men and Friends of the Sea Gary Aboud said a prop­er study was need­ed."Since the 1990s, they have been do­ing this and they made an an­nounce­ment last week that they will be start­ing in De­cem­ber," he said.

Pres­i­dent of TUFF Pe­ter Glodon said the boat own­ers alone were com­pen­sat­ed $222 a day by the Gov­ern­ment dur­ing the sur­vey pe­ri­od.He added: "That does not in­clude the cap­tain, the net re­pair­ers, the ven­dors. It can't even buy gas. It is ridicu­lous."We have been try­ing to get an au­di­ence with the min­is­ter for the past two years and the for­eign­ers are com­ing and do­ing it and our lo­cal peo­ple are not show­ing an in­ter­est."Glodon com­plained about the lack of con­sul­ta­tion with fish­er­men on the is­sue of the seis­mic sur­veys.He asked: "They picked up mo­men­tum with­out con­sul­ta­tion. Who has the God-giv­en right to de­stroy a man's work­ing en­vi­ron­ment with­out con­sul­ta­tion?"No­body. That's what they are forc­ing on us."Di­ane Chris­t­ian-Sim­mons, pres­i­dent of the Co­corite Fa­cil­i­ty and Fish Mar­ket As­so­ci­a­tion, said the seis­mic sur­veys should fol­low prop­er reg­u­la­tions just as in any oth­er coun­try.She added: "T&T is ba­si­cal­ly an oil-based coun­try that does not have prop­er reg­u­la­tions. They are rap­ing and mur­der­ing our fish­eries and it has dropped to nil."We want to be treat­ed equal­ly and pro­tect­ed the same as oth­er coun­tries. We are ask­ing the Gov­ern­ment to hold their hand un­til there is prop­er reg­u­la­tions."

EMA on seis­mic tests:A re­lease from the En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty said spe­cif­ic con­di­tions were set out for off­shore seis­mic test­ing."These con­di­tions make pro­vi­sions for min­imis­ing the im­pact posed to sea tur­tles and ma­rine mam­mals. "The con­di­tions gen­er­al­ly state that no seis­mic sur­veys will be con­duct­ed dur­ing the tur­tle-nest­ing pe­ri­od from March-Au­gust, the main leatherback tur­tle nest­ing sea­son, and al­so dur­ing Feb­ru­ary as the leathers are breed­ing off­shore."

En­er­gy com­pa­nies say:Petrotrin said dur­ing the sur­vey no ex­plo­sives will be used but "a dis­charge of com­pressed air to gen­er­ate puls­es for record­ing."In a me­dia re­lease yes­ter­day, Cen­tri­ca En­er­gy said it ad­hered to health, safe­ty and en­vi­ron­men­tal reg­u­la­tions.It said it had no plans for con­duct­ing seis­mic sur­vey­ing op­er­a­tions in T&T but stat­ed the con­duct of seis­mic sur­veys was deemed a "des­ig­nat­ed ac­tiv­i­ty" that was sub­ject to the ap­pli­ca­tion, grant­i­ng and terms and con­di­tions of a Cer­tifi­cate of En­vi­ron­men­tal Clear­ance from the En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA). The re­lease added: "All in­ter­est­ed or po­ten­tial­ly af­fect­ed stake­hold­ers are al­lowed to scru­ti­nise these CEC ap­pli­ca­tions and voice any con­cerns they may have with the pro­posed ac­tiv­i­ty in ques­tion. "The de­vel­op­ment of a com­pen­sa­tion frame­work for af­fect­ed fish­er­folk and as well as hav­ing ma­rine mam­mal ob­servers to point out and record mam­mal sight­ings for avoid­ance dur­ing the sur­vey is not­ed."