琉球嶼之鮪釣漁業發展

Abstract

The research explores the development of fishery on Liuchiu Island by reviewing historial documents and conducting fieldworks. Liuchiu Island locates at the southwest offshore of Taiwan, and is 8 nautical miles and 18 nautical miles respectively far from Dongkang and Kaohsiung. It covers the ground area with about 6.8 square kilometers. In early days the island's residents relied on the primitive agriculture and the offshore fishing with bamboo raft. As the islanders imported motor-powered-boats, the long-line fishery boosted after mid 1920's. Sharks and tuna caught by the fishermen were unloaded at Kaohsiung for sale. As a result, the offshore fishery dosely merged into the economic system in TaiwanAfter World War II, the fishery industry has gone through down and then up. In the 1970's, Liuchiu's fishermen switched to a closer port at Dongkang for landing and selling the fishes, as Dongkang's fish market has successfully developed its tuna export to Japan. In 1980's, the fishermen of Liuchiu applied 50-100 tones .fishing boat to further expand the fishing ground into the Indian Ocean and the West Pacific Ocean around the equator. The landing port then switched again to Guan, Penang at Malaysia, and Bali at Indonesia, in order to transport the tuna to Japan via air shipping. In 1990's, foreign crews were recruited to supplement the labor, and sustain the development of tuna long-line fishery for the labor shortage in fishery industry.Among the offshore islands around Taiwan, Liuchiuis unique by its highly developed fishery industry. This is due to its locational advantage with geographical proximity to the advanced fishing ports, such as Kaohsiung and Dongkang.