Vessel Renewal Plan a ‘Best Kept Secret’

Industry leaders have mixed feelings about government’s vessel renewal programme, but the South African Maritime Safety Authority (SAMSA) says it is in everyone’s best interests.

The old adage about building a boat is that it amounts to taking a long cold shower in R50 notes. Today that has become R200 notes.  Little surprise therefore that government’s fishing fleet recapitalisation plan is not a favourite topic in the board rooms of South Africa’s top fishing companies. The word recapitalisation is so loaded that SAMSA has renamed it a fishing fleet ‘renewal’ programme – to distance itself from the taxi recapitalisation programme.