DPT, SEMARANG – Efforts to make optimal use of the archipelago’s fishery resources are still facing various obstacles, ranging from limited capital to minimum infrastructure. The ability of the fishing fleet, most of which still use boats without motorbikes or with small motors, has resulted in limited fishing operational areas around the coast. According to data from the Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries (KKP) in 2016, the sustainable potential of Indonesian fishery production in 2015 reached 23.99 million tons of fish per year. However, the realization of national capture fisheries production is only 25% on average. Therefore we initiated to create a tool called AUTO-LION (Automatic Lighting FADs) to solve this problem.
AUTO-LION (Automatic Lighting FAD) was created by students from the Faculty of Fisheries and Marine Sciences and the Faculty of Engineering, Diponegoro University, chaired by Shasa Chairunnisa, and consisting of Nanang Setiawan, Irkham, Kristina Ekawati, and Ahmad Anwar, and supervised by Dr. Aristi Dian Purnama Fitri, S.Pi., M.Si who is a lecturer at the Faculty of Fisheries and Marine Sciences. Through the PKM (Student Creativity Program) event which has been going on for 3 months, the AUTO-LION team has collaborated with the fishermen of the step plan in Tambak Lorok Waters, Semarang, namely Pak Mudhofar in the framework of testing the tool. AUTO-LION is basically designed to assist a safe fishing system for resources. This is because AUTO-LION has the ability to select fish species to be caught, namely fish that are attracted to light and sound phenomena (positive phototaxis and acoustic). “We deliberately use sound and light attractors to attract fish attention, so that the fish will gather somewhere and facilitate the fishing operation process. The number of catches can also increase and the welfare of fishermen also increases, ”said Shasa Chairunnisa as team leader.
The FAD technology that is made has several technological advantages, namely the addition of sound factors and also a light attractor in the form of underwater lights that can turn on automatically at night so that it can stimulate phototaxis fish to get closer. The technology to be used is LDR, a microcontroller, with a source of electrical energy in the form of solar cells. LDR will read the situation at light or dark. After that the microcontroller will process the reading from the LDR. If it is dark it will be active so that the light is on. Meanwhile, when it is bright it is not active so the lights go out. The use of AUTO-LION does not require electrical energy from burning fossil fuels, but renewable electricity because the energy used is taken from sunlight which is absorbed by solar panels and stored in batteries. So that AUTO-LION is an energy-saving and environmentally friendly tool.
The trial results showed that there was an increase in catch by 10% for the use of FADs, 12% for the use of sound attractors and 25% for the use of light attractors. This is of course very beneficial for fishermen if this tool can be operated continuously. The AUTO-LION team hopes that their work can be applied and useful for fishing communities to improve their welfare.
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