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TRINCOMALEE BAY SPECIAL MANAGEMENT AREA Page | 34
150. According to the NECCDEP Interim SMA Plan for Trincomalee bay, most of the SMA
GN Divisions show poverty (Interim SMA Plan specifies that “Conventionally poverty is
viewed as the lack of access to adequate quantities of goods and services to satisfy an
individual’s material and social needs”). According to the assessment all SMA GN Division
poverty profiles are well below 45, which was the threshold chosen for ADB intervention.
151. Improving the economic situation of families in the SAMP area is a challenging task
because poverty creates increasing dependency on natural resources. However, high
poverty was not observed in the field studies and the situation might well have improved over
the last 2-3 years with the gradual improvement in the security situation in the area.
a. Fishing and fishing related activities
152. Fishing is the second most important economic activity after agriculture, and the
production in the District in the year 2000 was 14,500 tons. It has not recovered fully
following the Tsunami and due to the conflicting situation in the recent past. Restrictions on
the fishery industry have been reduced with the improved security situation and the industry
appears to be recovering rapidly over the last 3-4 months. The ability to transport the fish
catches directly to Colombo market has increased the buying prices of fishes and the income
of fishers has increased as a consequence.
153. About 21,000 fisher families live in the District and the majority of them are in the
SAMP area. There are more than 39,000 active fishermen in the District (www.ep.gov.lk).
There has been an increasing of number of fishers during the last few years. Figure IV.5
shows an increase in fisher families’ from 2001-2008. However most of the fishers supporting
these families are engage in deep sea fishing with larger boats and there is no direct threats
to the fishery resources in the TB SAM planning area from this increase.
Figure IV. 5. Trend in rising fishing families in Trincomalee District 2001-2008
(Source: DFAD data base. DSC 2009)
154. Many larger pelagic and demersal finfish species are found in the bay, but many are
over-exploited, especially the larger ‘game’ fish sought by spear fishermen such as trevally,
seer, marlin, barracuda and queen fish. Migratory fishes such as yellow fin and skipjack tuna