Fish in Trouble

The hunting of highly valued animals into oblivion is a symptom of human foolishness that many consign to the unenlightened past, like the 19th century, when bird species were wiped out for feathered hats and bison were decimated for sport. But the slaughter of the giant bluefin tuna is happening now.
The New York Times







This graphic is from an excellent Economist magazine report on the fishing crisis



Fish are in trouble. Numerous reports argue that all commercial fish stocks could be fished out by 2050, the very fact that we are discussing the collapse of fish stocks globally should be a huge cause for concern. However the media ignore the crisis and politicians have nothing to say.

In the late 1980s the once huge Newfoundland Cod population was destroyed the local fishing industry collapse and has never recovered. The technology has advanced to the point that fish can literally be hoovered up, demand has increased massively and over fishing is an epidemic.

The seas are increasingly polluted with plastic waste and chemicals.

The Economist, a free market magazine, and perhaps surprisingly a stalwart friend of fish ever where has pointed out the climate change could be the final straw. As carbon dioxide increases in the atmosphere, the oceans absorb CO2 and will if current trends continue turn acidic in just a few decades.

Exactly what this means for life in the sea no one quite knows. One fear is that the increasing acidity will kill off pteropods and similar creatures with calcium-carbonate shells or skeletons. A recent study found the seas acidifying ten times faster than previously believed, with disturbing effects on mussels, oysters and other animals living in coastal regions. But big fish in deeper waters might also be affected if entire species were lost at the bottom of the food web. Another worry is that the eggs and larvae of some fish may be unable to survive in more acidic water, and that creatures like squid which need a lot of oxygen will also die out. Any shortening of the food chain is likely to destabilise entire ecosystems, possibly leading to new ones in which just one or two species, such as jellyfish, predominate.

The Common Fisheries Policy has been a disaster. Fishing quotas are far too high, every year scientists call for less fish to be taken so that species can regenerate, every year politicians pressure the European Union to raise the quotas so that more fish can be taken.

In the Mediterranean the tuna is under severe threat.

The population of bluefin tuna is crashing after decades of overfishing, mainly by Europeans. This year a European body, the Community Fisheries Control Agency (CFCA), has gathered data on bluefin and conducted inspections. Green members of the European Parliament asked for the study in September. But nothing materialised until Philippe Morillon, the French chairman of the parliament’s fisheries committee, got the CFCA to produce a ten-page summary on November 6th. It concludes that “it has not been a priority of most operators in the fishery to comply with ICCAT legal requirements”. Rules on reporting catches and banning spotter planes have been flouted too.

Yet Raül Romeva, a green MEP from Spain, says this summary is a “sanitised” version. He believes the full report has been suppressed by the commission at the request of national governments because its contents are so embarrassing. The full report is said to contain details about the scale of infringements, including which countries are responsible. One-third of inspections, says Mr Romeva, led to an apparent infringement, such as inadequate catch documentation. The commission, he says, is covering this up.

The EU have even failed to record the quota data properly:

the Court of Auditors recently declared that the European Union's common fisheries policy (CFP), under which the European Commission sets maximum allowable catches, does not work. The auditors found that the actual level of catches is “unknown”, thanks to gaps, errors and “mis-statements” (ie, fibs) in data sent to Brussels by national governments. Most rule-breakers are not caught; those caught are seldom punished; and the few who are punished face trifling fines. Schemes to reduce overcapacity in fishing fleets have been subverted. This has severe effects. A survey of the north-east Atlantic found 81% of fish stocks to be dangerously over-exploited.

The EU has opened up fishing in the Seas around the UK to other European countries and failed to enforce the weak quotas. Often fish are thrown back into to the sea adding to pollution.

Fish farms are also failing...factory farming of fish has led to an increase in disease and a cycle of using drugs that cause damage,


A Norwegian fish farming multinational has apologised for offering to reward officials at Scotland’s environment watchdog with smoked salmon for giving the go-ahead for a new toxic pesticide in record time.

Marine Harvest suggested sending “some sides of smoked salmon” to staff at the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) after they processed applications to dose salmon cages with deltamethrin in a matter of days.

The suggestion was unethical and should never have been made, the Oslo-based company said. It promised it would be sparing Sepa any embarrassment by sending the agency “an unconditional apology”.

Last year salmon farmers were anxious to be allowed to use deltamethrin to treat sea lice, which eat fish alive. Previous pesticides were becoming ineffectual, as the lice were beginning to resist them.

But before the chemical compound, also known as AMX or Alpha Max, could be used, licences to discharge it into lochs had to be approved by Sepa. A series of emails between Sepa, fish farming companies and the Scottish government released under freedom of information legislation reveal how licence applications were handled.

Fish farms usually feed fish with fish meal causing yet more pressure on the seas.

Fish should be a key issue in the European Elections but my guess is that most candidates from most parties will not be thinking of fish conservation.

The Green Party of England and Wales would enforce tough quotas and prioritise local control of fisheries.

We have a policy of establishing marine protection zones to help fish stocks.

From cutting plastic pollution to real action on climate change the Green Party would seek to halt and reverse the damage being done to our seas.

If we ignore the fishing crisis...extinction will follow.

You can read about Green Party Fisheries policy here:
Short-term

FI400 We will work to release Britain from the Common Fisheries Policy of the EU. In the short term we will take every opportunity to ameliorate its worst features by the actions detailed in this section.

FI401 We will work to have licences required for all commercial fishing. They should be limited by quantity, specific geographical areas, seasons and specified selective, environmentally friendly fishing gear. Licences should be issued, in consultation with the industry, and favour small scale, less environmentally damaging vessels and fisheries.

FI402 We will try to get industrial fishing phased out. This undifferentiated catching of small species, for non-edible uses such as fish meal, makes up about a quarter of fishing activity world wide, but these species comprise an essential part of the food chain of wildlife and commercial fish. Phasing out could be accomplished by setting Total Allowable Catches (there are none at present); by progressively increasing the minimum allowable mesh size for nets; by closing the most sensitive areas completely and by seasonal closing of others.

FI403 Marine Protected Areas around our coastline should be designated with the involvement of all local user groups. The sea-bed and the wild-life in, over and around the areas will be able to regenerate. Diversity of the bio-system will be safeguarded and fish stocks will recover, allowing larger catches of useful species to be taken ultimately. This action will also contribute to our commitment to the EU Habitats and Species Directive. Scientific assessment will be used to decide the priority areas, but 10 to 20% of the total length could be designated eventually.

FI404 Sea Fisheries Committees which are responsible for fisheries management in coastal cells around England and Wales have a good record of inducing self- discipline amongst their members. Their role should be widened to encompass responsibility for wildlife conservation, in line with the EU Habitats Directive.

FI405 We will give a high priority to getting the discarding of fish at sea banned. It should be made illegal not to land all by-catch.

FI406 The importing of fish from other regions should be stopped. Many of these regions are poorer than ourselves and their people are under-nourished. Our progressive Resources Taxes (see also NR423) would encourage this change. It would then be possible to phase out all operating subsidies.

FI407 We will keep international commitments to protect wildlife from net entanglement (employing observer programmes, closed areas, etc). Types of gear which are particularly destructive of marine habitats and wildlife (including sea birds and mammals) such as beam trawling, scallop dredging, suction dredging, tangle netting and drift netting, should be strictly controlled, with a view to eventual phasing out, in favour of more selective methods. Any net having a significant chance of trapping a sea mammal, such as monofilament drift nets, will be prohibited immediately.

FI408 If licences are requested for new fisheries, Environmental Impact Assessment of the scheme should be required first.

FI409 While we are still restricted by the Common Fisheries Policy strong policing measures will be essential. There must be a unified enforcement strategy for all European waters, incorporating sophisticated tracking and data logging equipment and better port inspection.

FI410 The assessments of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea should be used to set realistic Total Allowable Catches for British waters.

FI411 As government has regularly encouraged the building up of excessive fishing capacity, it should accept a responsibility to offer adequate grants to boat crews to decommission vessels. Boat crews should be helped to establish themselves in alternative, sustainable employment. We must move as quickly as possible to a position where the remaining fishing effort will be small enough not to exceed the sustainable yield of the seas, and provide a viable livelihood.

FI412 Similarly, government should provide help to fishing communities to adjust to lower throughputs.

FI413 We should collaborate in international research to study marine life as a whole, so that the complex web of relationships can be better understood. Multi-species models will be used, in preference to single species ones, to manage fish stocks, so that the wider implications of fisheries are taken into consideration. All information will be made available publicly.

FI414 Areas of our territorial waters most damaged by fishing-related activities should be identified and closed to fishing, as a matter of urgency, to allow recovery of its fish stock and re-establishment of damaged habitats.

FI415 Further studies of fishing gear design to improve selectivity will be encouraged.

FI416 Decommissioning and licenses should be concentrated selectively to maximise the stocks according to research findings on conditions in each area. (Some researchers expect that under optimum conditions, catches could revert to as much as 40% above present levels.)

FI417 All gear should be required to be marked with the registration number of the operating vessel, and the use of elapsed time recorders will be investigated.

FI418 We will oppose all subsidies for all new fishing boat building until present excess capacity is eliminated.




This is the text of a Green Party emergency motion on marine reserves:

EMERGENCY MOTION: the Marine Bill must include highly protected marine reserves
Background: Many once common fish species have been severely overfished: Cod, Herring, Halibut and Whiting are at all time lows; North Sea spawning populations of Plaice, Mackerel, Saithe and Sole are being harvested unsustainably. At fault are over-exploitation and poor management. No change means these fish will very likely cease to be available for food.

Although the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) regulates fishing for the 27 member states, the UK has sovereign powers to create marine reserves. If these reserves protect the whole marine ecosystem then the UK will also be protecting its own fish stocks.

So that our fish stocks can recover, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, RCEP, has recommended that government set aside 30% of our seas as highly protected marine reserves. A Parliamentary Join Committee supports further points as below.

Currently, only 2% of UK seas are marine reserves. Less than 0.002% have highly protected marine reserve status.

The Friends of the Earth Marinet group is also calling for the proposals below.
Motion

The Green Party is highly concerned with the serious decline in fish stocks and marine biodiversity. We recognise that this is due to over-exploitation and to poor management.

The Green Party asks its various bodies and members to campaign for the following to be incorporated into the proposed Marine Bill :

* A legal duty on the Secretary of State to create highly protected marine reserves;
* For these to form an ecologically coherent network based on sound science;
* That a timetable be adopted for these to cover at least 30% of UK seas out to 200 nautical miles by 2015.
* That government should work to remove historic EU fishing rights in UK seas.



Bill Rigby who proposed the bill noted:

Hull and E.Riding Green Party celebrated today when their motion to launch a campaign for highly protected marine reserves was passed unanimously at Green Party conference in London.

"This success is good news - but the condition of marine species is close to disastrous," says Bill Rigby of the Green Party and the Marinet campaign.

“Right now, only 0.0001% of UK seas are marine reserves! The present Bill plans to extend this to a maximum of only 2% over an indefinite period. But the best science is urging at least 30%.”

"Highly protected marine reserves in the Bill will provide that chance but they're not in the Bill yet. Everyone needs to work hard to win over MPs - of whatever colour - for this vital ecological policy."

"We need radical action to give species a chance."

Join the campaign here - http://www.marinereserves.org.uk/

Bill Rigby, marine campaigner
Green Party, Beverley

To support the campaign for marine reserves click here.


WWF link on sustainable fishing

Marine Conservation Society resources on fishing here.