The Recent Trends of the Inland Fishery of Basrah Government, Iraq

Abstract

The fish species caught in the inland fishery of Basrah were recorded from seven landing sites between January and December 2022. A total of 14 types of fish from four families were identified in this fishery. The most commonly caught fish were exotic species such as Cyprinus carpio and tilapia species. In contrast, the landings of significant native freshwater fish that are characteristic of Mesopotamian aquatic environments, such as Carasobarbus luteus, Mesopotamichthys sharpeyi, Luciobarbus xanthopterus, and Arabibarbus grypus, dropped considerably. The total fish landing has been steadily increasing since 2009, indicating a positive trend in the overall landing. This growth may be attributed to the expansion of fishing activities and the prevalence of exotic species due to the degradation of the water ecosystem in Southern Iraq. From a fisheries management viewpoint, it is essential to maintain native stocks in the aquatic ecosystems in southern Iraq involving regional cooperation between Iraq, Turkey and Iran to secure the appropriate quantities of water for Iraq from the upper Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, strengthening the stocks of economically native fish by artificially propagating them and then releasing juvenile species into natural waters, and restrict the reproduction of carps and confining them to fish farms, and finally minimizing the impacts of tilapia species by intensifying the fishing activities.