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The video filmed on board a Chinese industrial trawler fishing in Ghanaian waters was graphic.
Obtained by the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), the footage began with the loud wailing of a man off camera. A trailing cable had snapped, seriously injuring his legs. As the camera zoomed in, he slapped his hands on the metal slab he was lying on.
There were no medications or medical personnel on board. When the trawler returned to port, the man, a fisherman from Ghana, was dead.
Fishing is one of the most dangerous professions in the world, but Ghanaian workers told EJF that they commonly suffer physical abuse, lack of clean water, low wages and long working hours that sometimes extend to 24 hours. Fearing retaliation, the workers spoke anonymously.
“We have been complaining, but we don’t have the power to stop it,” one fisherman told EJF. “As soon as you board the ship, it will be under your control. [If we speak up]They will fire us all when we return to port. Sometimes when you get fired, they will tell other companies not to hire you. “
Foreign ownership of trawlers is illegal in Ghana, but Chinese trawlers use Ghanaian front companies to fish. According to EJF, around 90% of industrial trawlers in Ghana are financed by Chinese companies.
Fishermen in Ghana described ruthless treatment at sea.
“Every time we pull the fish, the captain hits the ones who are not fast enough,” one fisherman told EJF. “He would take his boot, a stone or whatever, and hit you with it.”
Chinese crew members sleep in cabins, but Ghanaian workers are left sleeping on deck, under tarps that offer little protection from the elements. They suffer from stomach problems from drinking boiled sea water and are often slapped or kicked when trying to sleep.
“Sometimes our supplies [are gone] after 21 or 22 days of sailing, ”said one fisherman. “Sometimes, we are left with only gari [cassava root]” eat.
The workers said they do not work under contract and are paid a flat rate, no matter how long they are at sea or how much fish they catch.
“They do what they want,” said another fisherman. “They know we have no other job, so they have no choice but to work for them.”
Such treatment is common aboard Chinese trawlers throughout West Africa, said Peter Hammarstedt, director of operations for Sea Shepherd Global, which works with African governments to combat IUU fishing. The worst conditions he ever saw were aboard a Chinese-owned trawler fishing in The Gambia in 2019.
The ship was staffed with a Sierra Leonean fisherman who was staying in a narrow and squalid spot between the engine room and the wheelhouse.
“On that same ship, we treated one of the Sierra Leoneans for a foot infection that had not been treated for so long that our medical officer believed he might have lost it had it not been for our boarding and inspection,” Hammarstedt said. ADF in an email.
Ghanaian fishermen told EJF that Chinese trawlers often use an illegal double-net system to catch smaller fish such as sardinella and employ the prohibited practice of trawling. saiko in which a catch is transferred from a trawler to a large canoe capable of carrying about 450 times more fish than an artisanal fishing canoe.
Ghana’s waters are running low now.
In Gomo Fetteh, a fishing community in central Ghana, artisanal fishers said they sometimes go days without catching anything.
“Twenty years ago, when we talked about small-scale fishermen, it was a booming industry,” Nana JoJo Solomon, executive member of the Ghana Canoe Council, told EJF. “In the last 10 to 15 years, we have not seen a great season. Little by little, we are losing our livelihood. With the arrival of these industrial fleets, we realized that almost everything was gone ”.
