Aden^ Arabia^ June 



m Consulate ^ 



948„. 0 A 



UNCLASSIFIED 

 VOLUKTABY 



AIR IviAlL 



REC'D 

 JJNK 22 



DIST 



IIP* 



OCD 



FK 



NBA 



OFD 



EKP 



CIA 



COM* 



FISH 



TAR 



LCA 



ifl^HIl-^G Ii \DUSTHY OF THJ*; 



parea by Robert So Ferris, American Vice Consul 



Background of the Industry 



For many centuries along the southern coast of Arabia j, 

 whose shores are washed by the waters of the Gulf of Aden 

 and the Indian Oceans fishing has been a casual industry » 

 one whose production methods are most primitive, but whose 

 potentialities are believed great. There are none of the 

 intense p reduction methods which characterize this industry 

 in the United States or the Scandinavian countries - powered 

 vessels, packing houses, fish reduction plants =» but rather, 

 primarily, there is seen being utilized the primitive canoes 

 some very small dhov/s, and hand equipment « Actual product- 

 ion figures have never been compiled, but it is icnovm that 

 while most of the fish caught is used for local consumption 

 many shipments of dried and salted fish are sent irregularly 

 into the hinterlands ^ to Ceylon and India, and to the Briti&h 

 Somaliland coasts 



Location of Fishing Grounds 



There is no specific area where fish are most abundant, 

 as far as the Aden (Government authorities are able to deter- 

 mine » this seeming to remain the secret of the individual 

 fisherman o The continental shelf is ^uite narrow, of not 

 more than five or six miles extent into the Gulf; but along 

 this shelf, from the Island of ierim, in the btraits of Bab- 

 el-l;andeb, to the kahra Coast, approximately five hundred 

 '.T-.lles east of /iden, is done moat of the fishing for sardines ^ 

 rocK fish, snappers, and groupers. Shark, and export flah 

 primarily, is most often lakiin on the :..ahra Coast, at caocotra, 

 and on the Somaliland Coast » 



Jnf ortunately , southern x^xabia does not have good harbors « 

 nor is there very'much fresh water. Thus the technical diffi- 

 culties would be quite great should major expansion of this 

 industry be desired - v.hich appears to be true at this tii^ieo 

 The further east along the Southern Coast one travels the more 

 fish he finds. Accordim^; tc surveys made by the Fisheries 

 A-dvisor to the British Secretary of State the best fishing 



