MARGAO: The South Goa Planning and Development Authority’s (SGPDA) wholesale fish market re-opened on Tuesday after remaining shut for over a month-and-a-half.
President of the wholesale fish traders association Ibrahim Musa said that 35 vehicles carrying stock of fish from outside the state arrived at the wholesale fish market in the early hours of Tuesday.
It is expected to end scarcity of fish in Goa, a situation arising from the ban on fishing in the seas since June 1.
Consequently, prices of fish that had soared over the past few days are also expected to go down.
The fishing season in the state will begin from August 1.
With a view to preventing crowding at the market, the SGPDA had ordered closure of its wholesale fish market on May 6, and had remained shut since then.
However, locals had complained that fish vehicles coming to the market from other states offloaded their stocks outside the wholesale fish market creating nuisance.
Plans for upgradation of the wholesale fish market are in the offing since long.
In August last year, the SGPDA had given approval for seeking funds amounting to Rs 50 crore from the central fisheries department for constructing a state-of-the-art market at the existing place.
The proposal was to hand over the market to the fisheries department for execution of the project.
Upon the completion of the project, the market was to be taken back by the SGPDA.
A memorandum to that effect would facilitate the arrangement, it was decided.
However, the project, initially estimated to cost Rs 20 crore still lies on the drawing board of the State Infrastructure Development Corporation, the executing agency for the project.