The private sector in the fishing industry is constituted for the most part of fishing cooperatives.

The fishing cooperatives are organized as follows:

Each fishing cooperative is owned and operated by producers or fishermen. The fishermen in general meeting elect from among themselves a managing committee comprising of seven fishermen. These seven fishermen are empowered with the affairs of the organization for the day-to-day management of the organization. They employ an executive secretary or manager who in turn employs a plant manager and an accounting staff. Under the plant manger comes the responsibility of all handling of the products from receiving to packaging and freezing. As explained earlier, the functions of these organizations are primarily processing and marketing. This constitutes the structure of the organization at the primary level.

For the secondary or association level each cooperative is represented on the managing committee of the BFCA by one representative appointed from its seven-men managing committee. Each member society also appoints an alternate delegate. Each society is considered present at a general meeting of the association if a quorum of its managing committee is present. All the fishing cooperatives that are registered only four have their own processing and marketing facilities.