The National Fisheries Authority (NFA) will be launching its long-awaited online licensing and registration system in December of this year. Once persons are fishing, a licence is needed for both the individuals and the vessels.

The requirement for a licence to fish excludes persons fishing from the seashore or riverbank using a single line.

Addressing a JIS ‘Think Tank’, today (March 14), Principal Director for the Fisheries Compliance Licensing and Statistics Division of the NFA, Dr. Zahra Oliphant, said the NFA aims to regularise the industry to minimise the impact of Illegal unreported and unregulated fishing.

“We have a responsibility to ensure that on the ground and in the waters all our fishers and participants are so registered according to the law and so licensing is a very important aspect of the NFA. We will be launching an online licensing system and the name has been recently publicised, IrieFINS,” she said.

The new online licensing system is expected to reduce the time taken to produce fishing licences as well as to support the efficient management of the sector.

Dr. Oliphant said that the system will also allow persons to easily access the licensing system.

“It will allow us to modernise the sector, wherein persons are able, from their cell phones tablets and computers, from anywhere, to get their licensing done. This is a project that will see increased benefits for the entire sector, which we are looking forward to, ” she said.

The NFA’s implementation of the new system is being executed in collaboration with the Transformation Implementation Unit and the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service.

 

The new system will be a web-based application, bringing together information on the stakeholders of the Jamaican fisheries sector.

This will include commercial and recreational fishers and fish farmers, fish processors, vendors, importers and exporters of fishery products, vessel owners, equipment manufacturers and suppliers.

Contributed by the JIS.