South Africa's fish stocks are in deep trouble - and some are even close to collapse. That was the alarming message yesterday from the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in a presentation to parliament about the state of the country's fishing industry."Our country's resource situation is bad. We have stocks which could collapse at any time," acting deputy director-general Siphokazi Ndudane told parliament's portfolio committee on agriculture, forestry and fisheries."Some fish species could be completely eliminated," she said.The situation was being exacerbated by the fact that the department's only research vessel had been gathering dust for more than two years, Ndudane said.Stock assessments are currently carried out by private fishing industry vessels.Ndudane did not specify which fish species were most at risk, but scientists have recently expressed concern about west coast rock lobster and abalone, which are worst affected by poaching. Experts say the situation is likely to get worse.The department also expressed concern over the country's ability to monitor illegal trawlers due to problems with the department' s patrol fleet, which has been caught up in an ongoing tender rumpus.There was also a severe shortage of fisheries compliance officers, with only about 250 to cover the entire 3800km coastline.Committee member Zelda Jongbloed said the lack of accurate fish stock data was of vital concern."The fact of the matter is that we do not really know how the stock is doing," Jongbloed said.Johann Augustyn, secretary of the SA Deep Sea Trawl Industry Association, said: "We share the director's concern about certain fish stocks. While some stocks are in good condition, others such as abalone, west coast rock lobster and many line fish species are threatened by over-exploitation."Heavy poaching on these coastal species is the main culprit and we are aware that the DAFF does not have the resources it needs to address this, especially in terms of staff. It also needs to address the issue of corruption in the inspectorate," Augustyn said.Small fishing industry spokesman Andy Johnston said healthy fish stocks were vital to South Africa's food security."What we are doing is importing snoek, calamari and some lobster. Economically, it is not viable."Johnston said corruption in the fishing rights allocation process was to blame."We had a system that was so corrupt it left people outside. Genuine fisherfolk had no other alternative but to poach."..