PORT MARIA, St Mary — Fishers who use the Pagee Fishing Village in Port Maria and the Government agency mandated with ensuring that the village is being efficiently used are at odds over the source of problems plaguing the facility.

The National Fisheries Authority (NFA) has accused fishers of not doing their part to ensure the village — which has slipped into a state of disrepair — is properly maintained.

“The main issue identified was the lack of support from the fishers in the fishers’ association,” the authority said in a written response to questions from the Jamaica Observer.

“The fishers generally did not want to pay maintenance fees or dues to attend meetings [and this] has adversely hampered efforts to reorganise resources and manage the facilities at the local level,” it added.

However, when the Observer visited the fishing village recently, the fishers complained bitterly that Government had abandoned the facility.

They pointed out a padlocked bathroom, which they said has been out of operation for a protracted period of time because it does not have electricity and piped water.

They also noted that a concrete building, which they were to use when cleaning and selling their catch, had been vandalised and abandoned.

Former president of the local fishers cooperative Carl Oldfield, who was at the fishing village during the visit, placed the blame squarely at the feet of the NFA. The agency, he said, still has control of the physical structure.

“The cooperative can’t do anything about it [the building] until it has been handed over to them,” he emphasised.

But the NFA said the keys to the building were handed over to the local fishers’ cooperative in early 2010.

It added that the structure was completed in December 2009 by its parent ministry, the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries.

The NFA also stressed that, despite the challenges besetting Pagee Fishing Village, it is important — from a food safety point of view— that fishers have access to a proper facility.

“It is considered extremely important, especially as it relates to post-harvest handling and food safety, to ensure proper sanitation on fishing beaches that are important commercial sites for the sale of fish and fish products to patrons,” the agency said.

It promised to have the issues addressed.

“All islandwide assets owned by the Ministry [of Agriculture and Fisheries] on behalf of the NFA are systematically being identified and catalogued — including the tenureship of lands. The NFA is proactively addressing the redevelopment of these facilities built on fishing beaches, and how they will be properly devolved to the local cooperative or organisation for day-to-day management will be properly addressed.”

The NFA did not give a timeline for meaningful intervention.