Technological fixes won't save the oceans
Friday 7th October, 2011, 08:11, opinion by
For more than 40 years industrial fishing has been one of the biggest threats to the survival of the oceans. Industrial fishing means that the fish is caught for industrial use, not to be mixed up with fishing at an industrial scale which is how most of the fishing for the consumer market is done. The industrial fishing fleets catch what is commonly called 'trash fish' or 'industrial fish' - fish with low or no value on the consumer market. Instead these fish, in Europe usually the species sandeel (aka sandlance), sprat or pout, are processed into fish meal or fish oil. Many of the largest fishing vessels which catch for fish meal have the capacity to produce the fish meal product on board almost immediately after the catch.
Fish and other sea creatures which are considered of no value are dead when discarded overboard.
Photo by WWF
Fish meal is produced for three different industries: the meat industry feeding cattle, pigs and poultry such as chickens and egg laying hens, salmons and shrimps within the aquaculture industry and last but not least minks and foxes in the fur industry. Fish oil is used as fish feed in aquaculture as well as additional nutrition in different kinds of pet food or health products for human consumption. A type of nutrition which can also be extracted from plants and algae (including the omnipotent Omega 3) yet fish oil producers have a tendency of claiming the opposite. In 2009 the industrial fishing fleets share about 29% of the total world catch of fish and crustaceans, according to the UN Food and agriculture Organization. Approximately 40% of the fish meal production and about 50% of the fish oil is consumed by aquaculture.
Denmark has one of the European Union’s biggest industrial fishing fleets. In the mid 1980's, when the population of herring collapsed in the North Sea and Skagerrak due to heavy overfishing, the Danish fishing industry began targeting the smaller sandeel and is now well on its way to clean-sweeping the oceans of other species. The Danish quota for sandeel for 2011 is 94% of the total EU quota, which is equal to 228,514 tonnes of fish. The actual state of the sandeel population is currently unknown so the quota is set based on what scientists and politicians think is a sustainable catch, not based on solid evidence.
While CFP Reform Watch recently reported that a Danish company with two large trawlers made about € 1.15 million in profit a year, marine conservation organization Oceana concluded in a recent report that the majority of the fishing fleet in the EU without subsidies would actually make a loss of approximately 4,6% overall. The fishing industries of Spain, France, Denmark, United Kingdom and Italy received the most fishing subsidies, totaling a breathtaking € 1.9 billion, according to Oceana.
The dilemma of course is that to the ocean it makes no difference if the enormous take out of fish has a market value or not. Neither does it matter to the fragile sea life what scientists or politicians think is a sustainable level. The pressures which result from the industrial scale of the fishing process is something the marine eco-systems are simply unable to withstand.
The European fishery lobby are regarded as some of the strongest in the world. As an example of how the fishery lobby cleverly works its way into the public and political mindset, let's have a look at the language used when talking about industrial fishing. It is constructed in such a way that the public wouldn't really understand what amount of destruction lies behind the vocabulary. 'Trash fish' as mentioned earlier implies that we can catch as much as we want because it's something with a lack of value. However, to the ocean any species which lives in its great depths is there for a reason and has a role within the ecosystem.
'Bycatch' is another often used term, which refers to species that are caught unintentionally and discarded dead overboard. The size of the bycatch is, when using trawls, estimated to be anything between 10% to 60% of the whole catch, sometimes even up to 90%, depending on the species targeted and fishing technique used. The usage of the term however makes it sound like they catch a cod or two by accident, which are safely returned to the ocean, far from the real truth of this damaging practice. Very few animals survive the shock, stress and cruelty of being dragged in by a trawl, sometimes towed for several hours and then landed on the deck of a boat.
Just to give you an idea of the cruelty involved: what happens to most fish when they get pulled out of the water is that their swim bladder collapses. Their eyes tend to get popped out from their sockets as the animals are crushed by the weight of the 'tonnes' of other fish in the trawl. Species that have a fixed swim bladder may have it expanded to a size that forces its guts out of their mouth and anus due to rapid decompression caused by raising them at speed from the ocean's depth. This obviously goes for all fish, not only the bycatch.
Referring to this vastly destructive and unavoidable part of the industrial fishing process as mere 'bycatch' really does neither the lives of the millions of animals caught for consumption, nor those who are discarded as 'without value', any justice.
We are emptying the oceans using industrial fishing techniques in order to make the exceptionally abusive meat industry, aquaculture and fur industry even more effective and more profitable. Industrial fishing is one of the primary links in the chain of human cruelty to animals. By means of fishing subsidies, we are continuing to give hand-outs to an industry that will not survive economically otherwise and whose sole purpose is to support other cruel and unsustainable industries.
The ocean is a global common, not the property of a few companies to exploit at their discretion and ultimately destroy. In order to fight this ongoing slaughter we must understand that there is no technical solution or innovative 'fix'. Only by altering our consumption values and ultimately changing the way we live our lives the oceans can truly survive.
Please note: this is an opinion article and as such the contributing author is solely responsible for its content. The views expressed in opinion articles on this website are not necessarily those of The Black Fish. We encourage publication of opinion pieces as they contribute to debate and discussion around the important issues of marine conservation.
