4FJ campaign is asking supporters nationwide to help protect the nation’s food security by keeping the pledge to forego kawakawa and donu fisheries during their 4-month peak breeding season, which begins today. [File Photo]

During these trying times, the 4FJ campaign is asking supporters nationwide to help protect the nation’s food security.

The 4FJ campaign is asking Fijians to keep the pledge to forego kawakawa and donu fisheries during their 4-month peak breeding season, which begins today.

Scott Radway, executive director of change says COVID-19 has hit Fiji hard, and people will need to turn to the seas more in the months ahead.

Radway says, to ensure more communities get more fish, they need to fish smart, and for kawakawa and donu, that means making sure they get space to breed each year.

He is calling on Fijians, if you can, please keep the pledge.

In 2018, the Government of Fiji legally banned all fishing, transport and trade of kawakawa and donu during the peak spawning months, June through September.

Kawakawa and donu, known as grouper in English, are particularly vulnerable to overfishing because they gather predictably each year in the same channels to breed.

Those sites are often fished heavily, particularly for high-volume commercial fishing, leaving few fish behind to restock Fiji reefs. Of the known breeding sites in Fiji, 80 percent are declining or gone, Fiji government reported.

The 4FJ campaign, launched in 2014, seeks pledges from people across the country to forego these declining fish, June through September, their peak breeding months.

In return, the fisheries can recover and Fijians get more fish the other eight months of the year.

To date, 4FJ has received more than 26,000 pledges in Fiji.