“When I took over the Fisheries Corporation in May last year it was a loss making enterprise. It had sustained losses amounting to Rs. 103.8 million in 2009. We were able to reduce those losses to Rs. 59 million in 2010 and Rs. 23 million this year”, said Minister of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Rajitha Senaratne.
The minister was speaking at the opening of the 104th Fisheries Corporation sales outlet at the Uragasmanhandiya town. Senaratne assured the Fisheries Corporation would turn in a profit starting from 2012, and stated it would also be able to start paying the Employee Provident Fund (EPF) payments to its employees.
“We are spending Rs. 1.5 million on building these sales outlets. When I took over the ministry, the Fisheries Corporation had just 51 sales outlets and these too were not functioning. However, within 18 months, with the help of officials from the corporation, we succeeded not just in making these 51 outlets functional, but also in opening up new outlets and bringing them to a total of 104 by today. Our aim is to expand these outlets to 230 by 2013,” Senaratne said.
The minister went on to note they had been able to increase the corporation’s contribution to the sale of fish from 0.9% to 6%, and said their goal was to increase this further to 10% by 2013. The Fisheries Corporation has increased its revenue by 60% compared to 2009. The corporation sold 2678 metric tonnes of fish in 2009. This had increased to 3572 metric tonnes by September 30, 2011. “The revenue earned from this amounted to Rs. 1370 million and this proves the corporation is on the right track, and that it is with competent officials at the top, the minister said.
“Next year, we are planning to open the first ever tinned fish production factory in Galle as a joint venture between the Government and a private company. This will be the Government’s first tinned fish production factory. We plan on producing a daily output of 15,000 cans of tinned fish from this factory” Senaratane said.
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