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Fisheries

Kerala has a 590 km. long coastal belt, coupled with a wide network of inland water bodies. The area of the continental shelf of the state is around 40,000 sq.kms. There are 222 fishing villages in the marine and 113 fishing villages in the inland sector.

In 1999-2000 the projected fisher people population in Kerala is 10.50 lakh (8.09 lakh marine and 2.41 lakh inland). The total fish production is 6.68 lakh tonnes in 1999-2000, consisting of 5.94 marine and 0.74 inland.

The State has enacted the Kerala Marine Fishing Regulation Act with a view to enforcing strict regulatory measures for restricting the number of crafts and their operational areas. According to this Act the inshore area coming within in the depth range range of 50 metres has been demarcated for fishing by the traditional fishermen using country crafts and the area beyond this limit in the economic zone can be utilized by mechanised boats and large vessels. As this restriction is not being followed strictly, monsoon trawling has been banned as a conservative measure.

Fish Production
(lakh tonnes)
Year	Marine	Inland	Total
1988-89	3.75	0.28	4.03
1989-90	6.46	0.33	5.79
1990-91	6.78	0.36	7.14
1991-92	5.40	0.40	5.80
1992-93	5.53	0.42	5.95
1993-94	5.59	0.45	6.04
1994-95	5.49	0.48	5.97
1995-96	5.53	0.50	5.83
1996-97	6.61	0.52	7.13
1997-98	5.11	0.58	5.69
1998-99	5.82	0.66	6.48
1999-00	5.94	0.74	6.68
Source: Directorate of Fisheries

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