Red Sea

By Kesete Ghebrehiwet

The Southern Red Sea region is a land of opportunities as well as a land riddled with challenges. The putting in place of service rendering institutions in such a hostile climatic area is indeed beyond compare opportunity to the inhabitants of the region. Much of the development undertakings that have been registered in this area of the country require not only huge material costs but resistance of the people who engage themselves towards the realization of a better tomorrow.

Situated in the south east of the port city of Assab, Abo is one of the villages in the Southern Red Sea region. One who travels through this route never hesitates to make a tour and observe the service rendering institutions of that respective locality. Grapping one’s attention, a healthcare center and a kindergarten that are giving services to the inhabitants of Abo, indeed, prompt one to learn the progress that have been registered in the health and education sectors.

Sister Eden Hailu, head of Abo healthcare center, describes the overall healthcare services that have been rendering and particularly the prenatal and postnatal services at nominal prices. She said that giving vaccines to children by visiting their respective locality and conducting health related awareness raising programs have been part of the routine activities of the healthcare center. As the inhabitants of the area have been aware of the benefits of the delivery services that have been rendering at healthcare institution, a number of pregnant women have been availing themselves of the services.

A few meters away but within the premises of the healthcare center one could see a kindergarten which is giving regular pre-school services to the children of Abo and its environs. What is really impressing about the kindergarten is that a pre-school teacher who is in her twenties has been working there for the last 3 years. In these three years, Sister Natsnet Kidane has become fluent speaker of the Afar language. Pointing out that it is really a blessing to teach in a place which enables you to acquire a much different cultural and linguistic knowledge; she expressed her satisfaction to teach the children at ease with their mother tongue and also with a great passion.

Agricultural undertakings of the Abo-Kiloma administrative area are also very encouraging. Taking into account the arid and semi-arid climatic condition of this respective area, it is very easy to understand that conducting such agricultural activities depending on rainy seasons is really a very demanding task. But, farmers around this administrative area are doing their best in cultivating varied types of crops and vegetables. In about 6 heaters, one could see date palm plantations and other crops, vegetables and fruits and other plantations such as watermelon, pepper, tomato, onion, sorghum, maize which are at good condition.

Despite being an arid place, the Abo-Kiloma administrative area is rich in underground water which just requires no more than 2 meters drilling to find fresh water that could be utilized both for agricultural and for household activities. Thus, if the farmers of this locality exert concerted efforts water deficit could not become a hindrance. The palm dates in particular just need watering only for about three months for they could absorb the underground waters by themselves. So, it is a timely issue for the Ministry of Agriculture and other concerned bodies to take part in utilizing the potentials at disposal and provide the farmers with necessary pesticides.

Any passer by who knew the Southern Red Sea region some years back is obliged to admire the distribution of educational and potable waters supply in such a wider areas of the region. Beylul administrative area which is situated a few km away from the main Assab-Idi route is part of the Southern Denakalia administrative area. Even though it still needs a fence, the healthcare institution of this area is also giving full medical services. What is really worth mentioning is, however, the solar energy powered water supply project. Besides securing its sustainability through judicious utilization, the inhabitants of Beylul have been giving due care in protecting the project from any sort of damage.

Generally, the service rendering institutions that have been put in place in different areas of the Southern Region are very appreciable. But, Berasole administrative area still needs to have such services. Some healthcare institutions that have been constructed in such area have not been equipped with medical instruments and there is also a deficit of medical professionals.

Traveling to the southern Red Seal region one could not miss the region’s potential of producing wind energy. Wind turbines that have been erected in Assab have, for instance, been generating almost 1/3 of the city’s total demand. Wind energy suppliers equipment that has been put in place in many of the villages of the Southern Red Sea is in fact vivid example of such potentials. But, its sustainability would be endangered for proper renovation and maintenance has not been made for long.

Shabait

/CE

A new island has emerged in the Red Sea following an underwater volcanic eruption. Fishermen first spotted the phenomenon, which is caused by lava fountains, earlier in December in a remote part of the sea close to the Yemen coast.

The fountains are reported to have reached more than 30 metres (90 feet) in height. Nasa repositioned their satellite cameras to capture the event, resulting in some amazing shots of the volcanic explosion breaking the water.

Scientists are unsure whether the island will be permanent. According to a Nasa spokesman the Advanced Land Imager on Nasa’s Earth Observing-1 satellite captured the explosion.

“The image from December 2011 shows an apparent island where there had previously been an unbroken water surface,” he said.

“A thick plume rises from the island, dark near the bottom and light near the top, perhaps a mixture of volcanic ash and water vapour.”

The eruption occurred in a region of the Red Sea where the tectonic plates of Africa and Arabia meet, close to the Zubair Group of islands. Due to constant tectonic shifts, new ocean crust regularly forms along the rift.

For more visit: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=76801

CAIRO – Traffic through Egypt’s Suez Canal was disrupted for four hours on Tuesday after a ship ran aground because of engine failure in bad weather, an official maritime source said.

“A cargo ship ran aground due to an engine malfunction in the southern sector of the canal, blocking five ships behind it,” the source said.

An official from the Suez Canal Authority said shipping returned to normal at 1200 GMT after the ship, and another that ran aground later, were freed and moved.

A union official said some employees in the office of canal authority chairman Ahmed Fadel had gone on strike, joining a wave of popular protests that has gripped Egypt. He said this had not affected the normal functioning of the canal.

Five of Egypt’s Red Sea ports were closed on Tuesday because of bad weather, a spokesman for the Red Sea Ports Authority said.

Those affected included Nuweiba, Port Tawfik and Adabiya.

Reuters

Please find below an excerpt from an interesting article by Dr. Alex Cowie in  ‘Diggers and Drillers’ about South Boulder Mines, Eritrea, the Red Sea and the future potential of potash in terms of increasing global demand for fertilizer products needed to improve crop efficiency and agricultural output.

I’ll be up front about this. South Boulder is a speculative investment.

It may not be for the faint of heart. Its potash deposit is still in its infancy. And it’s two or three years until production. It’s also based in one of the riskier parts of Africa, Eritrea: a country that still disputes its border with Ethiopia.

So why have I bypassed my usual insistence on low-sovereign risk countries?

Because this potash deposit is too good to miss.

South Boulder is at early exploration stage of its 100% owned Colluli potash project. Progress has been very fast here. Drilling started on the edge of the Red Sea just six months ago, and the company has already announced its first resource figure of 548 million tonnes of potash. Let me put that in context. It is already almost half the size of Potash Corp’s 1132-million-tonne resource…  currently the largest in the world. Not bad for half a year’s work.

But what is even more remarkable is that this 548-million-tonne figure only factors in THREE of the 17 holes drilled so far. The other 14 are being tested right now. And the results will be factored into a new resource figure that you can expect to see before the end of March.

The company believes the resource figure will grow much higher, as they more than doubled the upper range of the exploration target to 1250 million tonnes. Whether this happens or not remains to be seen. But it would make it the largest deposit in the world. Is it really possible?  Let’s just say I reckon they’re being conservative! If you take into account that three holes has enabled a JORC compliant 548 million tonnes (Mt) inferred resource, you could infer 17 holes gets you to over 3100 Mt.

Of course, nothing is ever that simple in mining. But even if you halve that estimate – to be safe – you’re still looking at 1550 Mt. And that still exceeds Potash Corp’s figure.  And the company is planning a lot more drilling yet.I need to point out that most of this will be in inferred category, which is only the first hierarchy of resource classification. More good drilling results between the current holes will be needed to upgrade it to a ‘measured’ resource that you could be more confident of.

The 17 drill results so far have been very consistent. But this is typical of a deposit created by an ancient sea bed drying out. Millions of years ago this was an inlet of the Red Sea.

The land changed and the inlet was cut off from the sea. So it dried up into a twenty metre thick layer of potash, which then got covered over by a shallow layer of rock.

So it’s not like a gold or copper deposit where the grade can vary from one metre to the next. Potash deposits are more like a coal deposit, where you get a predictable blanket lying across the whole basin. It’s also important to point out that they have only scratched one small corner of their exploration license…..

To read the full article please visit http://www.portphillippublishing.com.au/osi/

Please note that Diggers and Drillers requires you to subscribe  to their paid content to be able to read the full article.

Washington – Modern humans may have left Africa thousands of years earlier than previously thought, turning right and heading across the Red Sea into Arabia rather than following the Nile to a northern exit, an international team of researchers says.

Stone tools discovered in the United Arab Emirates indicate the presence of modern humans between 100,000 and 125,000 years ago, the researchers report in Friday’s edition of the journal Science.

While science has generally accepted an African origin for humans, anthropologists have long sought to understand the route taken as these populations spread into Asia, the Far East and Europe. Previously, most evidence has suggested humans spread along the Nile River valley and into the Middle East about 60,000 years ago.

“There are not many exits from Africa. You can either exit” through Sinai north of the Red Sea or across the straits at the south end of the Red Sea, explained Hans-Peter Uerpmann of the Center for Scientific Archaeology of Eberhard-Karls University in Tuebingen, Germany.

“Our findings open a second way which, in my opinion, is more plausible for a massive movement than the northern route,” he said in a telephone briefing.

Because of the different climate at the time, Arabia was moister and would have been a grassland with plenty of animals for prey, he added.

And the lower sea levels at that time meant that the narrow point at the southern end of the Red Sea would have separated Africa and Arabia by between one-half and 2 1/2 miles, said Adrian G. Parker of Oxford Brookes University in England.

That should not have been a difficult crossing for people used to dealing with east African lakes and rivers where they used rafts or boats, Uerpmann said.

The techniques used to make the hand axes, scrapers and other tools found at Jebel Faya in Sharjah Emirate suggest they were produced by people coming from somewhere else, said Anthony E. Marks of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, adding that there are similar tools made about that time in East Africa.

“If these tools were not made by modern man, who might have made them?,” Marks asked. “Could Neanderthals have made them?”

Neanderthals were mainly in Europe and migrated into Russia but “there is no evidence for any Neanderthals south of that” zone at that time, he said. “To suggest one group of Neanderthals took a turn south and went several thousand kilometers … seems to me a very difficult explanation and one that doesn’t follow any reasonable logic.”

The tools were dated using optically stimulated luminescence, which is able to date the sand grains on top of the tools and determine when they were last exposed to light, explained Simon J. Armitage of the University of London.

The discovery “points convincingly to an early dispersal of (anatomically modern humans) along a southern route, from eastern Africa into South Arabia,” said G. Philip Rightmire of Harvard University, who was not part of the research team.

Rightmire said “it is reasonable to hypothesize that Arabia represents a separate center for population expansion, in addition to the northern Levantine corridor. This hypothesis remains to be tested, as new evidence is compiled.”

The research was supported by the government of Sharjah, Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, Humboldt Foundation, Oxford Brookes University and the German Science Foundation.

AP

Eri-Fish

Shabait, Massawa, 19 January 2011 – The Massawa-based ERI-FISH Plant has introduced modern equipments that would enable it to produce competitive fish products at global level, according to Mr. Ibrahim Khalifa, manager of the plant.

He told ERINA that the equipments introduced at substantial government expenditure includes various devices, and has a vital role to play in ensuring the safety of fish, beyond its contribution to rendering efficient service.

Mr. Ibrahim further explained that the reforms introduced by the Government as regards the price of fish products with a view to harnessing marine resource for the benefit of the people and the nation, as well as encourage exports has prompted local fishermen to enhance fishing activities.

He further stated that with the introduction of the modern equipments, fish products are expected to show double-fold increase this year.

Mr. Ibrahim also urged the general public to cautiously and neatly utilize fish products, and he particularly urged the residents of Asmara to refrain from buying fish the source of which is unknown.

It is to be noted that ERI-FISH Plant operates under the umbrella of the Eritrean National Fish Corporation.

A Yemeni-Eritrean summit was held on Thursday in the Eritrean capital, Asmara, and co-chaired by President Ali Abdullah Saleh and Eritrean President Isaias Afeworki.

In the summit, the two leaders discussed the joint cooperation between the two countries in various areas and means of boosting them, especially in areas of trade, investment, fishing and security.

They confirmed their keenness to establish a strategic relationship between the two countries to enhance cooperation areas at the political, economic and security levels, as well as cooperation in combating maritime piracy and terrorism so as to serve the national security of the two countries and the stability in the region.

Moreover, they touched on activating the joint committee and the agreements signed between the two countries, in addition to the establishment of a trade fishing company.

Furthermore, the two leaders dealt with the developments of situations in the region, topped by the situation in Somalia and the Horn of Africa and the security in the southern Red Sea, as well as a number of common issues concerning the two peoples of Yemen and Eritrea.

After that, the two presidents spoke to media at a press conference, in which President Saleh expressed his happiness for visiting Eritrea, noting to the topics he discussed with his Eritrean counterpart in the summit.

” Views were identical , as we agreed on coordination and information exchange for cooperation in the southern Red Sea and the fight against piracy and terrorism and everything related to the national security of both countries”, Saleh said.

For his part, the Eritrean president said that the relationship between the two countries is strategic and there is a common vision between them towards a number of security and economic issues.

Source: SABA

Rome, 14 September 2010 – The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is supporting a grant in Eritrea with the goal of raising production and productivity in the fisheries sector, while conserving fish stocks and the marine ecosystem.

This grant agreement for the Fisheries Development Project of US$12.6 million was signed today at IFAD headquarters in Rome by Zemede Tekle Woldetatios, Ambassador of Eritrea and Kanayo F. Nwanze, President of IFAD.

Eritrea’s coastal area, once home to a strong fisheries sector, has been destroyed by decades of war. The country has some of the few remaining underexploited fish stocks in the world, however, little support has been provided to the country’s fishing communities to take advantage of these rich resources.

IFAD’s supported project aims to strengthen the artisanal fisheries sector and ensure sustainable resource management, this will contribute to reducing poverty by increasing the fishery sector’s contribution to the national economy, as well as improving food security in the region.

The project will reach about 6000 households made up of poor artisanal fishers, foot fishers, women, young people and demobilized soldiers living in the regions of Assab, Massawa and the 70 villages along the Red Sea coast. Target groups will receive support to form cooperatives in order to access boats and equipment on credit. Training will be provided to fishers both men and women, to carry out shore-based activities such as net-making. They will also have the possibility of owning boats.

With this new programme, IFAD will have financed 4 projects in Eritrea for a total investment of US$ 55.8 million.

Asmara

Centric Energy Corp. (TSX VENTURE:CTE) is in talks to kick-start oil exploration activities off the cost of Eritrea. The company is in negotiations with the Government of Eritrea and other exploration corporations.

Centric Energy has submitted an application for a production sharing contract (PSC) to the Eritrean Government in October 2009, according to media displays on the company’s web site.

While the final agreement has yet to be worked out, the Eritrean Ministry of Mines and Energy in Asmara granted Centric exclusivity for the application area.

The geographic area of interest includes the Dahlak Block in the Red Sea, where Italy’s Agip conducted field surveys and drilled wells on the Dahlak archipelago in the 1930s.

The wider terms of the PSC are said to include an initial four-year exploration period followed by two optional extension periods each of two years.

According to the Chief Executive of the company, the key to unlocking Eritrea’s petroleum potential has yet to be found. However, he is confident that with serious determination oil and gas potentials can be uncovered, given that a lot of work had been already started earlier and given that the existence of oils shows and gas blow-outs can be regarded as evidence for untapped resources.

“The discovery of gas only would not impact negatively the attractiveness of Eritrea as a offshore destination, given that the increasing number of mining companies will boost the demand for power,” he adds.

He estimates the need for power in Eritrea will increase at an rate of 10 MW per each mine under production.

Centric Energy has been introduced to Eritrea by Canadian mining company Sunridge Gold, supporting the Eritrean Governments efforts to build a strong oil, gas and mining industry.

Eritrean president, in an exclusive interview, says refusal to obey is cause for US anger. By Abdul Nabi Shaheen, Correspondent,
Gulf News.

Massawa: Eritrean President Isaias Afewerki has disclosed for the first time that the US asked him in the past to provide military and intelligence facilities in the Assab area on the Red Sea coast, south of Eritrea, but his government refused.

This was before the US headed to Djibouti to use it as a headquarters of the central command of the Western forces in the Horn of Africa.

In an exclusive interview with Gulf News in the port city of Massawa, President Afewerki said that Washington also asked him about 2002 or 2003 to deploy Eritrean officers to work under the central command in Djibouti but his country rejected the request.

The President categorically denied that Israel asked for any military or security facilities in his country.

Afewerki scoffed at the sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council on his country, noting that these sanctions were not new and that they had already been applied for more than ten years.

“What is new in these sanctions is that they were only issued officially from the UN Security Council which is run by Washington as it wants,” he said.

He said Eritrea was able, by the will of its people, to overcome all kinds of economic and military sanctions.

On the other hand, Afewerki denied the press reports that his country signed an agreement with Tehran under which Iran was awarded an exclusive right to develop an old oil refinery in the Assab area.

Following is the full text of the interview:

Gulf News: What is your strategy to face the repercussions of the Security Council Resolution 1907, which imposes economic and military sanctions, on your government?

Isaias Afewerki: There is nothing new in the international sanctions, except for the fact that they were issued formally in the name of the UN Security Council, which is driven by the United States of America as it will. Arms embargo was imposed on our country more than 10 years ago, specifically since the outbreak of the border crisis with Ethiopia.

We have been prevented from importing spare parts for training aircraft and helicopters that we had already purchased from European countries due pressures from Washington on these countries and on the arms companies.

Even more, when we bought light weapons from Russia three years ago Washington contacted Russia and claimed that they seized the weapons in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, and they told Russia that we gave these weapons to Islamic extremists in Somalia.

Generally, the issue of the arms embargo on our country is not new, but who believes that this can weaken the defence capabilities Eritrea is dreaming. “To every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” This is a scientific theory known to those who study chemistry and physics.

Since the era of the administration of former US President Bill Clinton, Washington tried to impose an economic blockade and used every possible way, the latest attempt was to block money transfers of the Eritreans working abroad after they realised that such transfers of hard currency would strengthen the revenues of the state treasury.

They tried to stop these transfers by what I would call the “piracy banks” overseas and in some of our neighbouring countries, but the Eritrean people were able to invent a new means to overcome this hurdle. This enabled the Eritrean expatriates to deliver their money remittances to their families at home.

It was our right as a member of the United Nations to get assistance from the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other international financial institutions, but we are prevented from this by a US decision adopted several years ago. But our people were able to overcome these challenges by relying on their own resources. Despite the drought that hit the Horn of Africa, we were able with God’s help alone to produce enough food.

Has Washington ever asked you to play any role or provide specific military or intelligence facilities, and you refused it, a matter which made the US take a hostile stand against you?

Maybe.

What do you mean by “maybe”?. This question is likely to have only two answers, either yes or no.

Yes, yes, but we totally rejected the idea of foreign camps in the region and refused to use Djibouti land as a location for Western military and intelligence work in the region.

We were asked around the year 2002 or 2003, I do not remember the exact date, to deploy army officers in the Central Command, currently in Djibouti, as part of regional troops from Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Djibouti, but Sudan was not invited to this operation.

Why did you refuse to contribute troops to the Central Command in Djibouti as long as it is outside your territory?

If we participated in this operation, we would turn into mere tools in the hands of the Western military command and this is what happened to the countries that participated, especially after the events of September 11, when special units in the name of combating terrorism were established in these countries. These are intelligence units operating under the Central Command in Djibouti.

We said if the required thing is to combat terrorism, it is in our interest to fight it by ourselves, and not by proxy. If there are American or Western aids in this field, there is no objection, provided that the basis of terrorism combating should be African and should be carried out by the countries of the region itself.

You spoke before about the facilities requested by Washington to deploy troops in Djibouti. Has Washington asked you for military or intelligence facilities inside the Eritrean territories?

Yes, there was talk about giving them facilities in the area of Assab. Though this was rejected by us, in principle, but our conviction increased after we consulted independent American and European international experts, who advised us to refuse giving them these facilities.

Ethiopia has given them the region of Debre Zeyit and other locations in the territory of Ogaden under the pretext of conducting joint military exercises and training of peacekeeping forces heading to Darfur.

But I personally, do not think that this rejection is the reason for the American anger against us. It may be a part of a number of other reasons, most notably that the State of Eritrea is not obedient to the Super State.

Mr President – it is certain that Israel has strategic interests in the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea. Has it ever courted you as it did with some Arab countries? What did Israel ask you and what is your response?

I tell you quite frankly that Israelis are not stupid and cannot ask any country for military or intelligence facilities, because they have other means that enable them to deal with this region. They have no security or military base in any place in the whole region operating in the daylight.

Why didn’t you announce a clear and formal stance on violation of the territory of Saudi Arabia by Al Houthi rebels in Yemen, despite your good relations with Riyadh?

We cannot be asked to announce this, because there is an agreed principle that any attempt to destabilise the region, whether in Yemen, Saudi Arabia or the Gulf region, is unacceptable. Eritrea is part of the stability of the region and a part of the stability of Saudi Arabia and Yemen, and any attempt to undermine the stability of these two countries affects the security of the Red Sea and the entire region.

But if the announcement was just for showing signs of solidarity, then Saudi Arabia and Yemen know our rejection of this aggression and they were not waiting for confirmation from our side.

Some media reported in 2008 that you signed in September of that year during your visit to Iran a deal with Tehran giving them an exclusive right to develop the old oil laboratories in the city of Assab, but when I visited the refinery two days ago I did not find any maintenance and it is completely abandoned?

[Laughs] We do not have any agreement with Iran to develop the refinery. What was reported in this regard was a part of a wide spread misleading campaign. Thanks to God, you visited the refinery and took photos without finding any such a thing, although we are in 2010 and the misleading media stated that the agreement was signed in 2008 as you said.

There are Gulf, Arab and Western fears from Iranian influence on Bab Al Mandab Strait in the Red Sea through facilities provided by Eritrea, which shares with Iran a hostile stance against the US. Some believe that you can give these facilities just to spite Washington.

Dealing with Iran just to spite America at the expense of the governments and peoples of this region is madness and cannot be done by anyone. I believe that the alleged Iranian bogeyman is one of the mechanisms of the US to intimidate countries in the region to achieve its own agenda. If there is a danger from Iran, or from any other foreign source, Arab countries should cooperate to protect the area from any external risks.

erifish

Roxanna Samii, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) -I first visited Eritrea in 2008 and it was love at first sight. In December 2009 when I landed in Asmara airport, I felt like I was back home. I spent my first couple of days visiting the irrigation schemes in zoba Debub and then went east to zoba Northern Red Sea where I visited Massawa, the capital city of Northern Red Sea Zoba which is the centre of Eritrea’s fishing industry.

Massawa is one of the hottest places on earth, with temperatures soaring well above 40C (104F) and 80% or more humidity for much of the year. Yet, like rest of this beautiful country, it has its charm.

Eritrea is a relatively rich country in terms of natural resources. It has gold, potash, zinc, copper and salt. What is perhaps less known is the fact that Eritrea also has significant fisheries resources and that 20% of the coastal population’s livelihoods depends on fisheries. However, unlike the gold or copper, fisheries resources, if properly managed, can continuously provide food, employment and income to the coastal communities.

Eritrea’s 1,200km coastline is highly favourable for artisanal fishing offering rich and varied fish stocks and sheltered fishing grounds. Unlike artisanal fishers in other parts of the world, Eritrean fishers have not overexploited their resources and could potentially increase their catch from the few thousand tons per year to at least 40,000 if not 80,000 tons per year.

Their fish stocks include lizard fish, threadfin breams, and catfish (soft bottom demersal); snappers, emperors, grunts, job fish and groupers (hard bottom demersal and reef fishes); sardines and anchovies (small pelagic); tunas, mackerels and sharks (large pelagic); shrimp, crabs, lobsters (crustaceans); and squids and octopus and cuttlefish (cephalopods).

“Eritrea’s fisheries sector has the potential to contribute substantively to our national food security and can play an important role in reducing poverty in coastal areas”, says Andom Ghebretensae, Director-General Regulatory Services. “Currently we have 3,000 licensed artisanal fishers. Eritrea’s coast not only is rich in fisheries resources but also has great potential for tourism.”

The Government of Eritrea has long recognized this potential and in collaboration with a number of donors such as the African Development Bank and the European Union has built EU standard landing and processing sites. These sites are fully equipped with processing and storage facilities, where trained personnel weigh, process and grade the catch.

Eritrea’s fish exports may have been low in recent years (approximately 234mt in 2008), however, thanks to the upgrading of landing and processing facilities, today Eritrea is eligible to export fish products to European Union countries.

Eritrean artisanal fishers aspire to become entrepreneurs

Eritrean artisanal fishers use two types of fishing boats – houris or sambuks. Houris constitute 80% of the fishing fleet. These are wooden boats and measure anywhere between 8-13 metres. It has an outboard engine and can take up to five people on board.

Sambuk, 16 metre wooden boat with an inboard engine, constitute approximately 9% of the fishing fleet. Sambuks can take up to nine people on board.

The remaining 11% is made up of fibreglass reinforced plastic boats imported from Saudi Arabia or Yemen, although some are also being built in Eritrea.

“I have a traditional wooden boat called a houri which I bought thanks to a 5 year loan”, says Ahmed Hamid, an artisanal fisher. “There are three of us and with our boat we can go between 8-10 kilometres from the shore and we can always count on an average catch of 800 kilos”.

“During the fishing season – which is approximately seven months – we make about 2-3 fishing expeditions per month. We use small nets and usually stay out in the sea for an average of 10 days”, explains Hamid

“We buy ice from Massawa Fish Landing centre for 0.80 nakfa per kilo and use it to preserve the fish on board”, says Hamid proudly. “We sell our entire catch to National Fisheries Corporation which then sells it to processors such as Erifish. They buy the snappers for 22 nakfa per kilo and the groupers go for 25 nakfa. And we use 20% of our catch to repay the loan”.

On the landing site, Hamid and his fellow fishers unload their 800 kilo of first class tuna, snappers, emperor and groupers in big blue containers. Their catch is immediately taken next door to the EU certified Erifish processing plant, where a team of 24 people degut, process and packaged the fish for export.

“I have everything I need on my traditional boat – a cellphone, my medical kit and a transistor radio – but I would like to buy fibre glass reinforced boat, so that we can stay a maximum of a month and come back with an average catch of 1.5 tons”, said Hamid with a smile. “And I look forward to the day when I am able to sell part of my catch freely on the market”.

Fisheries sector can help ensure national food security and provide investment opportunities

In Eritrea, meat is the preferred source of protein. Fish consumption is estimated at 0.5-1kg/person/year which is low compared both to the average Africa consumption, estimated at 8kg/person/year.

“We need to encourage our people to eat more fish and to consider fish as an alternative source of protein”, says Seid Mohamed Abrar, Director, Office of the Minister of Marine Resources.

“We have high market value fish and we can fish approximately 80,000 tons per year without any risk of depleting the fish stock”, says Abrar. “By exploiting our fisheries resources, we can contribute to ensuring food security for our coastal population and help the artisanal fishers to improve their livelihoods.”

This is why the Government of Eritrea requested IFAD’s assistance to design a fisheries development project to support artisanal fishers in the Red Sea coastal regions.

“The IFAD-funded Fisheries Development Project under the auspices of the Ministry of Marine Resources will reorganize and strengthen fishers’ cooperatives and support artisanal fishers so that they can increase their incomes and improve their food security”, says Abla Benhammouche, Country Programme Manager for Eritrea. “This project will help Minister of Marine Resources to make the fisheries sector sustainable and at the same time reduce illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing.”

The Fisheries Development Project will build the capacity of fishers such as Hamid and equip them with modern fishing techniques and better and secure boats and fishing gears. At the same time, the project will encourage private sector initiatives to add value to the processing and packaging process, also build the capacity of Erifish to better market the catch domestically and expand their export markets.

To support private sector investment, artisanal fishers such as Hamid will be allowed to sell 20% of their catch to private processors and traders, with the prospect of increasing this percentage as private sector further develops.

Last but not least, private sector investment can help transform Eritrea’s Red Sea coast into a flourishing tourist resort, offering spectacular diving opportunities and uncontaminated beaches. “We can become a viable rival to other Red Sea resorts such as Sharm el-Sheikh”, says a proud Abrar.

Legacy of a visionary American biologist: Mangroves for all

During World War II Dr Gordon Sato, a biologist spent some time in a concentration camp called Manzanar in California desert. During his internment he developed his vision of eradicating hunger by enabling African nations to feed themselves. He invested half a million dollar of his own money in the Manzanar Project.

This visionary philanthropic scientist conceived this project as low-tech solution to hunger and poverty and to combat the impact of climate change, when climate change was neither on the international agenda nor on the talk of the town!

The project started during the 30-year war to win independence from Ethiopia. Sato first joined the Eritrean fighters in 1987 and introduced fish farming. He succeeded in growing fish and providing high protein food for the wounded. After the war, he focused on issues related to economic development and applied what he knew best – biological principles – to develop a self-sufficient economy in a country that is prone to drought and famine.

However, soon he saw the potential of mangroves to increase food production all the way up the food chain.

In an interview, Sato said: “I was in an area with mangrove trees, and I noticed the camels eating them. I got the idea that the trees could also supply food for sheep and goats. There was lots of available space for growing mangroves, so it seemed like an obvious solution. Initially, I had to figure out how best to grow them and how to make the mangroves good food. We found that mangroves would be adequate food for livestock, as long as they were supplemented by a small amount of fish meal prepared from fish waste.”

Years later, thanks to the Manzanar project and Sato’s legacy, Eritreans are using fresh leaves and dried mangrove seeds as livestock feed. This project has also taught herders that the seaweed that washes up on shore can be dried, processed and used as animal feed.

Ammanuel Yemane, Manzanar project manager, takes pride to showcase Sato’s teaching. Sato and his team reached the conclusion the mangroves were growing in areas where rainwater was washing into the sea. The rain was providing nitrogen, phosphorous and iron – elements lacking in seawater. The team buried the seeds with a piece of iron and a punctured bag of fertiliser rich in nitrogen and phosphorous and saw the mangroves flourishing.

Today, Yemane and his team work with women, men, herders and fishers of Hirgigo village to teach them how to use the same technique to plant mangroves so that they can effectively address sustainable resource issues such as providing food for livestock, protecting the fish and preventing deforestation. “The village is now learning to manage the mangroves and we can recover the lost mangroves in approximately 6 months”, comments Yemane.

The IFAD-funded Fisheries Development Project will join forces with Yemane and his young group of dedicated and passionate Eritrean to support the rehabilitation of the mangroves and to:

• build capacity of fishers to develop viable and sustainable business plans
• teach fishers how to protect marine natural resources such as the coral reefs
• teach fishers to form cooperatives
• organize exchange visits

A brighter future

Through out their history Eritrean people repeatedly have shown their resilience and resoluteness. It goes without saying that they will be able to unleash the potential of their untapped gold mine – their fisheries sector – in the most sustainable manner and as a result contribute substantively to improve the livelihoods of the coastal population and create a vibrant local private sector.

Oil Rig

Saudi state-owned Aramco has been administering a tender for a seismic survey of Saudi territorial waters in the Red Sea. Industry sources said European companies have submitted bids to survey 14,000 square kilometers in a project worth up to $200 million.

Some of the bidders were identified as Norway’s Petroleum Geo-Services, the Netherlands’s Fugro and Britain’s WesternGeco. Aramco has been preparing to begin drilling for energy reserves in the Red Sea in 2012.

The sources said Aramco has deemed the Red Sea the next major source for crude oil and natural gas for the Saudi kingdom. Saudi Arabia has reached a capacity to produce 12.5 million barrels of oil per day.

Exploration activities are taking place across the red sea region. Sudan has recently started drilling its first overseas offshore exploration well in the Red Sea Basin off Sudan with the help of the state China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC).

The well falls in Area 15 under the franchise of the Red Sea Petroleum Operating Co., a consortium of five firms including the CNPC, Malaysia’s state oil firm Petronas, Sudan’s state oil firm Sudapet, Nigeria’s Express Petroleum and Sudanese firm High Tech Group. Petronas and CNPC each have a 35 percent interest in the block 15.

According to the Sudanese minister of Energy and Mining the results from prospecting for oil and gas in the Red Sea are positive.

Tokar-1 is one of two exploration wells in Block 15, located some 130 kilometers southeast of Port Sudan. The CNPC and its partners plan to complete drilling in six months. The wells have a designed drilling depth of 3,700 meters, and water depths of 38 meters and 52 meters respectively.