WU in collaboration with Department of fishery and NGOs organized outreach activities for free to raise awareness about overfishing and sustainable fisheries
Every years, Walailak University in cooperation with the Fisheries Office of Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) such as Association of Thai Fisherfolk Federation, also with support from the National Research Council of Thailand and The Agricultural Research Development Agency (Public Organization) organized outreach activities to raise awareness about overfishing and sustainability among the participation of local fishermen, commercial fishermen, students and the young population from Nakhon Si Thammarat and Surat Thani provinces.
In 2022, the educational outreach activities operated under the project of the research and academic services for Blue swimming crab restoration based on international fishing standards (Fishery improvement project: FIP). It was a course consisting of a size-catch number of aquatic animals, not using illegal fishing gears to protect long-term ecosystem sustainability, in line with the ecosystem-based approach, to ensure that fisheries resources are maintained or restored related ecosystems in Nakhon Si Thammarat and Surat Thani Provinces, Southern of Thailand where Walailak university located nearby.
The training also aimed to raise awareness on the prohibition of catching immature animals, uncountable fishing mortality, ghost fishing, animal life cycle, food chain of marine ecosystems, bycatch, growth and recruitment, survival, and maximum sustainability yield of importantly economic species. The knowledge is significant among those fishermen as the key man who can both use and protect fishery resources which is important as food security for all life on Earth, including humans. After the training, fishermen and other participators had a better understanding of fisheries overfishing and ecosystem sustainability. The fishermen agree to not catch young marine animals and to not use illegal fishing gears.
Moreover, In 2022 and every year, Walailak University, in collaboration with the Department of fishery of Thailand and NGOs such as Thai Sea Watch Association and Federation of Thai Fisherfolk Association, organized a yearly meeting to transfer knowledge for locals fishermen not to catch, buy, sell and eat small aquatic animals caught by illegal fishing gears. The campaign provided knowledge with no registration fee. The objectives of this education outreach were to raise awareness of overfishing, to create a forum for exchanging knowledge on fisheries and ecosystem management practices with fishing community participation. In the campaign, there was knowledge on the size of the aquatic animals that should be picked up by fishing, and destructive fishing tools that catch small fish and destroy the seabed, which is the crucial habitat of some aquatic animals. Additionally, academics and researchers from the Department of Fisheries came to educate local fishermen on unreported and unregulated fishing to provide ideas of fishing responsibility for fishermen and other audients.
Related links:
Goal 14: Life below water
Goal 4: Quality education
Goal 17: Partnerships for the Goals