The Ministry of Fishery in Cuba (MIP) promotes actions among the people living in the coastal areas toward the preservation of the turtle, an endangered marine specie, on which Cuba will soon set the closed time for its capture.

Biologist Idania Lee González, of the Empresa Pesquera e Industrial Camagüey (EPICAM), said that the MIP together with the National Office of Inspection carry out the program Sustainable Fishery in the locations of Cocodrilo and Nuevitas.

The purpose is to halt the legal and poaching capture of the Hawksbill, the Caguama and the Green turtles, that have been for many years source of food for the people living near the coasts.

With this move, Cuba joins the countries that started the closed season recommended by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), of which the Caribbean nation is signatory since 1990.

The expert informed that starting in 2008 and for a period of ten years, the MIP will ban the capture of the turtle which has been practiced by Nuevitas' fishermen in areas near Romano and Guajaba cays and in the zone of Cocodrilo, in the southeastern coast off the Isle of Youth.

The project encourages the fishing by casting the bait or by using 50 mm or higher rhomboid-shaped nets to avoid the capture of young individuals.

It also organizes information workshops, drawing contests for primary school students and the printing and distribution of educational materials like calendars, brochures and posters; all of them depicting the importance of protecting the turtles.


(ain)