An Appraisal of the Marine Fisheries of Orissa, India

Abstract

This paper presents the trend of marine fish landings of Orissa during the period 1975- 2006. The marine fish landings of Orissa indicated a general increasing trend from 16,804 t in 1975 to 1, 01,500 t during 2005 contributing to an average of 2.6% of the all India marine fish landings. Demersal fishery resources including crustaceans and molluscs dominated the landings ranging between 6575 t during 1977 to 56,556 t during 2005. The pelagic fishes contributed to 8497 t during 1977 to 44472 t during 2005. A total of six types of mechanized and motorized gear each and seven types of non-motorized gears were operated off Orissa during 2005 & 2006.The total effort both in units and Actual Fishing Hours (AFH) was greater during 2005 (5.91 Lakh units & 35 Lakh AFH ) than during 2006 (5.49 Lakh units & 31 Lakh AFH). While motorized gears expended more effort in terms of units, mechanized gears had put in more AFH during both the years. Gear wise, all the resources were landed more by mechanized gears followed by motorized gears and non-motorized gears. Resource wise, pelagic fishes were contributed mainly by carangids (21%), ribbon fishes (19.5%) and other clupeids (13.5%). The major contributors of demersal resources were croakers (35%), pomfrets (17%), catfishes (16%), and silver bellies (5.4%). Crustacean resources were dominated by penaeid prawns (78%) followed by non-penaeid prawns (11.6%) and crabs (9.25%). Seasonally, all major resources were landed more during October to December and January to March period