Tongan fishing ventures buying deregistered old fishing boats up to 80 years old from New Zealand, using a soft loan scheme offered by government, are running into trouble.

Tongans are re-registering the boats to a Tongan flag before they leave New Zealand, meaning Maritime NZ has no jurisdiction to enforce safety standards and the risky boats are uninsured.

The soft loans for fishing ventures were offered by the Tonga government to boost the growth of its fishing industry. The loans fund launched in August 2014, made $13 million pa’anga available through the Tonga Development Bank at  interest rates of 1% and 4% for priority private sectors, such as Agriculture, Fisheries and Tourism.

The short terms of the loan scheme put pressure on borrowers to get their boat in a hurry so that they could go out fishing to repay the loan. Unfortunately, because they were buying used fishing boats from overseas, borrowers overlooked a number of serious security issues.

Nine boats

Leta Kami, the General Manager of the Tonga Development Bank said that a $1 million allocation was designated for the Fisheries Sector, and since 2014 nine fishing boats has been bought by fishing entrepreneurs, with low interest loans from TDB.

The government's Development Loans Scheme came into the spotlight after the FV Losimanifo’ou, a Tongan fishing boat with a crew of five were rescued by the cruise ship Albatros, which took them to Auckland in early February. The FV Losimanifo’ou that had been bought with a TOP$188,000 (NZD$120,000) loan from the TDB under the scheme was left adrift.

The fishermen had been fishing for snapper several hundreds kilometres south of Tonga.

The owner, Fetu’ulele Taukitoku Fetu’ulele returned to Tonga to face a tough reality. He had no insurance on his NZD$120,000 low interest loan from the TDB or his trawler, FV Losimanifo’ou. He was also already a month in arrears with his loan repayment and his fishing catch had been abandoned with the boat.

He now faces the prospect of losing his property, which he put up as collateral.

New Zealand trawlers

According to the Stuff news website, Fetu’ulele is struggling to make ends meet. His only source of revenue is his share of the $23,000 that was donated by passengers and crew of the Albatros to split with his crew.

According to the report most of the trawlers that Tongans bought from New Zealand were from Greymouth, Picton, Havelock, Timaru and Dunedin. They were about 12m, ranging in age from 45 to 80 years.

Documents show the Kainga was re-registered under a Tongan flag in September 2016.

Tony Kokshoorn, the mayor of Greymouth said that independent inshore fishers have been squeezed out of the market by bigger operators, and ports around New Zealand have been filled up with old fishing boats that no-one wants.

He believed that New Zealand should be careful about shipping boats out to an unsuspected person in another country who doesn’t really know what they’re buying.

"A lot of these boats have been de-registered and they aren't exactly safe."

"Some of these boats are not capable of getting to Tonga - it's not just the hull, it's the motors.

"We've got boats down there that have been sitting there for five to 10 years and haven't gone anywhere."

For New Zealand commercial vessels to be able to leave New Zealand for overseas, they need a Certificate for International Voyage from Maritime New Zealand.

“But the Tongans re-register the boats to a Tongan flag before they leave New Zealand, meaning Maritime NZ has no jurisdiction.”

Safety

So the question remains, what is the Tongan government going to do to secure the safety of its fishermen who are desperate to make a living by buying rotten old fishing boats?

Meleami Tualau, from Tonga's Marine and Port Division of the Ministry of Infrastructure, in a helpless tone, explained that the first thing they have to do is to change the law.

In the meantime the unsafe, uninsured fishing continues.