Fisheries and Marine Resources Minister Derek Klazen has denounced the practice of unfair dividend distribution in joint ventures. 

Klazen has called on the fishing industry to cease the practice.

The Fisheries and Marine Resources Minister made the remarks when he delivered his annual address at Walvis Bay.

Derek Klazen revealed that the unfair distribution of dividends causes conflicts within joint ventures.

The minister noted that last year, his office was overwhelmed with cases of unfair dividend distribution, but after his intervention, the cases had decreased. 

He has called on the joint ventures to solve their own problems instead of approaching the minister.

"We need to be honest because when we applied for the rights, we were friends; now the rights are given, quotas come in, money is coming in, and the eyes are going like this. How can I get more by making that one get less. I was shocked the other day when somebody was with me and said I only received N$10,000 once and then nothing. Now that I'm asking the company to look at my side, the company says you can get a few boxes of fish. To do what?"

The Walvis Bay Business Chamber Chairperson, Johnny Doeseb, compared the joint ventures to forced marriages and called on the ministry to change the conditions used to group companies into such arrangements.

"You can't force me to marry two wives if I only want one wife. If the vision is not the same, it must be the same for the results to be seen. If you want these fisheries and marine resources to flourish, we need to look at how we force the joint ventures."

The minister indicated that the ministry's joint venture approach is working for many companies.

"These people that are following the ministry policy to have joint ventures prosper do their social responsibility as joint ventures, and they are really contributing to our country. An individual right holder that only has that little that he is working on and negotiates on his own with companies will not have a big impact like a joint venture."

Klazen says he will consider allocating quotas directly to joint venture companies only to increase benefits in the fishing sector.