Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Villafuerte is pushing for the creation of a new full-fledged fisheries department to enable the country to save P23 billion in losses yearly.

Villafuerte, chairman of the House committee on fisheries and aquaculture, said in a statement that the operations of the pint-size Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources has resulted to inadequate management of the country's fisheries resources. He cited an environment monitoring-assessment report showing that the Philippines' lack of proper management of fisheries has been costing the country P23 billion in economic losses every year.

If the government invest P1 billion yearly to maintain a new fisheries department, he said, the result would be a savings of 50 percent of the P23 billion and it can easily get a return on investment of 11 to 12 times, the press release said

. Villafuerte added that a whole department looking after the development and management of fisheries will greatly help in building up the country's food supply.

He said it is ironic that despite the Philippines' being the world's eighth biggest fish producer, it still have a department looking after the fisheries sub-sector.

The country's fisheries output is projected to hit five million metric tons this year, up 13 percent compared to the 4.4 million metric tons produced in 2006, according to the BFAR, the press release said.

The robust fisheries production growth is being driven by the double-digit expansion in aquaculture output, mainly on tilapia, prawn, milkfish or bangus, grouper (lapu-lapu) and seaweed.

The Philippines is the world's second-biggest producer of tilapia, next only to China, the press release said.

Accounting for almost 25 percent of total agricultural output in terms of value, fisheries was the biggest gainer among all (agricultural) sub-sectors in the first quarter of 2007, growing at 8.52 percent, the press release added.

In 2006, fisheries also posted the biggest advance, expanding at 6.31 percent.*

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