Victor Skeete was one of the key figures behind the establishment of a navigation programme for the country’s fishermen.
Though now retired, he still teaches some aspects of the programme.
Skeete, a graduate of the Caribbean Fisheries Training and Development Institute, comes from a family of fishermen from Six Men’s, St Peter, and has always worked at sea.
He started out as a merchant marine, and has worked as a marine park naturalist; diving and participating in the research and development of the Barbados Marine Reserve at Folkestone.
Additionally he has worked as a tug mate at the Bridgetown Port.
In 1983 while working at the Fisheries Division he trained the first cohort of fishermen in navigation, working fully with that programme until 1990.
Skeete recalled that the programme started as a result of the loss of a large amount of fishing boats.
When the rebuilding process got underway, the fishermen decided that instead of day boats, they would build larger ice boats and put in an ice box.
The day boat would normally not venture beyond where the crew could see the coast of Barbados. There was a major problem of boats going adrift, fishermen dying at sea and boats being lost.
“In 1983, we only had about five ice boats operating from the island and in the next three to four years the number jumped to 40, but there were no fishermen equipped with the knowledge to carry them out so they had to learn navigation,” Skeete said.
Before satellite navigation was implemented, he added, the old time fisherman said they had to use the position of the stars to guide them back home. Now the youngsters have their laptops and their smart phones.
When the course was about to get underway, Skeete said that he sensitized fisherfolk by going around to the various fishing communities on Saturday afternoons to tell them about the training that was available.
By 1985, it was developed to such an extent that fishermen from St Vincent, St Lucia and St Kitts came up to do the course.
The programme includes instruction in international regulations for preventing collisions, safety of life at sea, coastal navigation, electronic navigation and satellite navigation. They are also taught fish handling and financial management and the programme is updated from time to time.
Skeete said the classes are drawing big numbers and the participants are mostly fishermen. He said that at a graduation in November last year the group was mostly youngsters who are actually interested in pursuing work in the field.
Skeete said he would also like to see an all-encompassing component of the course where fishermen are taught basic engineering, net weaving and repair – boat building that would keep the fishing industry going.
He called for the implementation of a fisherman’s licence so that no one could willy-nilly get on a boat and act as captain taking a crew out to fish.
“The same way cars and vehicles on the road need to be insured and the drivers need to have a licence, having a fishing boat costs a quarter million dollars so they should have a licence.”
Now, he said an owner licenses a boat and gets a fisherman’s card but they can give anyone their boat to take out to sea.
With the fishermen being trained and the boats having the necessary technology on board, the fishing industry is primed to flourish, Skeete added.
He said the only issue is that there should be rules within CARICOM that would make fishing across borders beneficial to all parties.