As dawn breaks, the fishing wharf at Tamba Kula in Freetown buzzes with the movement of early-morning commerce. Fishers just back from days spent far out at sea unload their catch from wooden boats, hauling snapper, barracuda and other fish out of icy compartments into cartons carried onto shore. There, women hand over wads of cash and fill plastic containers destined for Freetown’s bustling markets. Bleary-eyed fishermen cluster in packs under palm trees, smoking cigarettes and cracking jokes as Nigerian pop music blares from nearby speakers.
The scene is a familiar one along West Africa’s coast, where artisanal fishers like the ones at Tamba Kula provide millions of people with their daily nourishment. The ocean is the backbone of life in Sierra Leone, with fish accounting for around 80% of the country’s protein intake. Incomes generated from the sea build houses, are reinvested in businesses, and send the children of fishers and market traders to school.
But life is getting harder in places like Tamba Kula. Over the past few years, fish have become scarcer, and the rickety boats with names like “God No Greedy” are having to go farther out to sea for catches that just a few years ago could be found much closer to shore. Sometimes the crews come back near empty-handed. When that happens, the boat owners lose their upfront investment in fuel and the crews don’t get paid.
Many fishermen say foreign trawlers are to blame. Those boats, made from steel and fiberglass, use industrial equipment to catch hundreds of times more fish than the small wooden boats can. In a competition playing out on Sierra Leone’s seas, its artisanal fishing communities are losing.