But fishermen will no longer be at sea, given the right kind of facilities.In the age of computers and remote sensing, a satellite will not only tell fishermen where and when to venture out for a good catch, but will also specify the exact direction, how far off the coast the best catch would be and how deep below the surface are the fishes.

Here is a sample of what the Division of Oceanography, Hyderabad has to offer. Issued in the third week of February, scientific data from the division said: Maximum fish can be caught between 17 and 22 kilometres off the coast of South Gujarat in the Arabian Sea till February 20. If that was not precise enough for fishermen, the data added that a good catch will be possible between 7 and 10 metres below the water surface. Precise with latitudes and longitudes, the data simplifies matters further for the fishermen - South East off the Surat coast, West off the Navsari Coast, South off the Valsad coast, South West off the Daman coast and North West off Maroli coast in South Gujarat.

Sounds great, doesn't it? However, none of this data is useful to fishermen of Surat. The reason being none of them have trawlers (fishing boats that have nets that can be dragged from the bottom of the sea bed). Also, there are no harbours that can accommodate trawlers, no processing houses, no cold storages in South Gujarat. A harbour is being developed in Umargan of Valsad district for the past few years though with a 50-50 per cent share of the central and state government.

``This data is absolutely precise and is 100 per cent result oriented as these are satellite pictures and constitute scientific data,'' says deputy director of Fisheries R T Sarvaiya. He, however, adds that ``given the infrastructure facilities and type of fishing, the data is of no great use in South Gujarat. But it can be of immense use to those venturing off the Saurashtra coast and Bombay High''.

The percentage-wise figures of marine fish landings for the State in 1997-98 make it amply clear. Surat district contributed a measly 1.36 per cent of the total catch in the State, Valsad was better off at 10.68. But that figure, too, Sarvaiya says was because trawlers from the Valsad coast go for fishing to Saurashtra and Bombay High during the fishing season. The bulk of Gujarat's fishing is on the Saurashtra coast.

So what is being done here in South Gujarat is Gill Netting, where fishermen pin down nets to the floor and wait for fish to land in. Bombay duck is the most common marine fish that South Gujarat fishermen manage to net, as figures depict. Another drawback here is the sea bed. ``What is required is a muddy bed, while it is more rocky here is South Gujarat,'' Sarvaiya states. Besides, the water here is more turbid -- dense as it has a larger content of waste canal water, river input -- forcing the authorities to abandon a project to launch Out Board Motors (OBMs) in boats in place of the In Board Motors (IBMs) in most boats here. OBMs are more powerful and can travel larger distances into the sea.