Berita lama. Hanya untuk membuktikan dan mengingatkan bagaimana sifat penjahat 
nempel pada kaum revisionis-imperialis, apapun bangsanya, termasuk Tiongkok. 
Tiongkok, sebagai pemilik armada penangkap ikan terbesar di dunia diserang oleh 
bu Menteri Susi sebagai pelaku kejahatan transnasional yang 
terorganisasi...Ha...ha.. betapa tepatnya!!! Seperti juga usulnya dulu supaya 
Indonesia keluar dari G20. Sudah tentu maling tidak akan mengaku maling!!!! 
Jadi tak heran pejabat Tiongkok menolak tuduhan itu!! Mana ada sih kekuatan 
imperialis di dunia ini yang mengaku merampok kekayaan negeri lain!!! Susi  
cerita para penangkap ikan Tiongkok bahkan keliling tiga perempat dunia untuk 
menangkap ikan hiu di kepulauan Galapagos yang merupakan daerah yang 
dilindungi, artinya seharusnya tidak boleh ditangkap ikannya!! Ha..ha.. mana 
mau mentalitas imperialis menerima daerah lindung!!! Keserakahan kaum 
imperialis, apapun warna kulitnya, sudah dibuktikan berkali-kali di dunia 
ini.Sayang, ibu menteri ini menodai namanya dengan menyetujui reklamasi Teluk 
Benoa yang jelas-jelas sudah ditolak rakyat Bali yang sadar lingkungan

‘CHINA CALLS IT FISHING, INDONESIA CALLS IT CRIME’: PUDJIASTUTI FINDS HER 
TARGET FOR OCEANS SUMMIT

The Indonesian fisheries minister – known for her penchant for blowing up 
wayward vessels – sets her sights on Chinese habits ahead of an international 
conference that will tackle overfishing

BY DAVID G ROSE
18 OCT 2018 / UPDATED ON 22 OCT 2018

Susi Pudjiastuti, Indonesia’s minister for fisheries and maritime affairs, has 
a strong message for China, owner of the world’s largest fishing fleet.

“What they are doing is not fishing, it is transnational organised crime,” she 
tells This Week in Asia after a press conference in Jakarta. “You should write 
that. They need to understand.”

The straight-talking, self-made businesswoman, who is known as much for her 
chain-smoking and tattoos as her no-nonsense approach to policy, has been 
holding forth on her favourite topic: the pillaging of her country’s waters by 
foreign fishermen.


“We have had several disagreements [with China] on issues of illegal, 
unregulated and unreported fishing, they still disagree that it classifies as 
transnational crime,” she says, ahead of this month’s Our Oceans Conference in 
Bali. “But mostly these are China-origin vessels [with] multinational crews.

“Without international cooperation, we will not be able to fight this.”

This tattooed Indonesian fisheries minister will blow your mind (and your boat)

In four years, Indonesia has banned 10,000 foreign-registered vessels from 
fishing in its waters, half of which have been more than 500 gross tonnes (GT). 
Hundreds of vessels have since been seized and sunk – in some cases blown up on 
Pudjiastuti’s orders, as a deterrent to others.
They have come from mainland China, Taiwan, Thailand, and the Philippines. Some 
have disguised their true origins by sailing under multiple flags or being 
registered to proxy companies in Indonesia or elsewhere.
China has expressed serious concern over the destruction of vessels and, two 
years ago, said it would take action against overfishing and the fishing 
industry’s overexpansion, including cutting down the number of fishing vessels.


Last week, an official from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said 
Chinese authorities would impose “zero tolerance” punishment on domestic 
vessels found to have violated laws and regulations in high-sea fishing, 
according to the hawkish tabloid Global Times.

Deputy director of Sea Fishery Administration Liu Xinzhong was quoted as saying 
China cared more about the protection and sustainability of marine resources 
than other countries thought.

But according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, more 
than a third of the world’s commercial fish stocks are being diminished at 
unsustainable rates.

With domestic Chinese fish stocks among those declining at speed, in part due 
to growing demand for high-quality, fresh seafood from middle-class consumers, 
Beijing appears also to be increasingly encouraging “distant water fishing” far 
beyond its own exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

“A 100 GT vessel in a year can catch 2,000 tonnes of fish. It’s millions of 
tonnes, billions of dollars,” Pudjiastuti says. “It’s a multinational big 
business. They call it fishing. We call it crime. We do disagree [with China] 
on that.”

China’s trade war pain can be Asean’s gain

Ministers and heads of state from 35 nations are to attend this month’s Our 
Oceans Conference along with 200 non-governmental and private sector 
organisations. Maritime security, climate change and pollution of the seas will 
be on the agenda as well as overfishing.

But so far China – like many of Indonesia’s neighbours in the Association of 
Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) – will not be sending any high-level 
delegations.

Undeterred, Pudjiastuti says she has in her corner many island or coastal 
nations that are most vulnerable to over-fishing and climate change, and she 
will campaign for increased monitoring and enforcement of existing protected 
territories such as marine conservation areas.

She points out Chinese fishermen have been caught poaching sharks as far away 
as the Galapagos islands in the Southern Pacific Ocean, one of the world’s 
ecological treasures.

“How can fishermen travel three-quarters of the world’s surface and take 400 
tonnes of sharks from a maritime-protected area?” Pudjiastuti asks, exasperated.

“Hopefully with interest and international cooperation on traceability, 
legality required to declare catch in ports, China will finally understand that 
they have to accommodate international concerns on distant fishing.”

While Beijing denies any wrongdoing, its fishing boats, supported by coastguard 
and navy vessels, have also been seen as testing its territorial claims in the 
South China Sea. In 2016, an Indonesian patrol boat seized a 300-tonne Chinese 
fishing boat, Kway Fey 10078, for fishing near the Natuna Islands, where 
China’s infamous “nine-dash line” marking its South China Sea claims overlaps 
Indonesian waters.

Pudjiastuti says the poachers are now switching tactics, to operate from the 
high seas, beyond national jurisdictions: “With modern technology, and the size 
of equipment, with 150km long lines, with 100km of nets, they can drop the nets 
in the high seas and pull [the catch] from within the exclusive economic zones 
of everybody.”

Without more international commitments to tackle the issue, she adds, migrating 
fish which range across the seas such as yellowfin tuna and cod, will suffer.


“The benefit of the no-jurisdiction high seas is only for the 11 states who do 
distant fishing,” she adds. “But these migratory fish stocks are the world’s 
fish stocks, not just Indonesia’s fish stocks, it’s also Japan … Europe … also 
China’s fish stocks, so we hope the concern on this is recognised as well.”

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Friday said the government took the 
usage of fishery resources very seriously and would develop its fishing 
industry responsibly and in an environmentally sustainable way. It had cracked 
down on illegal fishing and was strengthening its education of fishermen and 
supervision of fishing vessels, a faxed statement said.

“We hope the relevant authorities can take an objective and fair view. If 
Indonesia has evidence that they bring to the Chinese, we will seriously 
investigate it.”

Pudjiastuti’s idiosyncratic ministerial style is well documented on social 
media, where images of her dancing to The Beatles, drinking coffee and smoking 
on a wakeboard or crowd-surfing over her ministerial staff have gone viral.
As well as advocating a plastic bag ban and banning single-use plastic bottles 
and straws from her ministry, she has also outlawed certain bureaucratic jargon 
in the name of efficiency: “Sometimes, every word needs a seminar: I hate that.”

Meanwhile, the tough policy on illegal fishing appears to be paying off for the 
20 million domestic fishermen in Indonesia’s vast archipelago of 17,000 
islands. While total fishing in Indonesian waters has dropped by more than 25 
per cent and foreign fishing by 90 per cent since Pudjiastuti imposed her bans 
in 2014, the size and value of the domestic catch has swollen from 7 million 
tonnes to a predicted 13 million tonnes this year.

The challenge is not over, however. Although foreign fishing is being curbed, 
destructive methods such as using drag nets or explosives, are still being 
perpetrated by Indonesia’s own citizens.

Purjiastuti is still confronting traditional attitudes to her country’s marine 
resources, which range from struggling fishermen up to her cabinet colleagues, 
which she characterises as “take as much as possible, as soon as possible”.

To combat this, “we put policy on banning trawlers, fighting destructive 
fishing using bombs and cyanide. We need to change attitudes and we still have 
a lot of problems [but] we have important lessons on fighting climate change 
and sustainable fish management to share.”

She says sceptics – are you listening, China? – should be persuaded by the 
economic benefits of regulations that promote sustainable fishing.

“I would like to put it all in a book,” Pudjiastuti says. “To convince several 
heads of state who still think that ‘climate change is not an issue, it’s just 
a rumour, it’s not affecting anyone’, that prioritising climate change and 
environmentally friendly measures is actually economically very profitable.

“I would like to share how, with just an US$8 million budget for patrol, 
surveillance and sinking of illegal fishing boats, we are saving millions, even 
billions of dollars. Maybe then they will get the point.”

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