Jeffrey Gettleman, the East Africa Bureau Chief for the New York Times, visited Wildlife Conser-vation Society’s marine program in Antongil Bay, in northeastern Madagascar as part of a story on mosquito net fishing. “It was the most interesting of all the mosquito net trips we made” said Jef-frey Gettleman. “I have done a lot of research on this topic and this is the first place I have heard where there is a community backlash against this type of fishing.” In his article published on the front page of the New York Times on January 25 2015, Jeffrey wrote: “When seines made from mosquito nets land on Antongil Bay’s beaches, it’s like peering into the stomach of the sea: a squishy mass of sand, seaweed, dead blowfish, dead baby eels and thousands of baby shrimp, their bodies translucent, their tiny eyes black dots no larger than specks of sand. Because Antongil Bay is considered a crucial shrimping ar-ea, Madagascar recently banned the use of ramikaoko nets there. But the government has been in such disarray since a military coup a few years ago that enforcement of the decree is now up to a group of threadbare vigilante fishermen. The group calls itself Fearless, and it prowls the pebbly, windswept beaches, looking for mosquito nets to seize.” And they have been successful with 96 fishing seines made with mosquito nets seized by local fishers patrols and then destroyed by Government authorities in May 2014.
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