Overfishing causes Pacific bluefin tuna numbers to drop 96%

[xchrom]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jan/09/overfishing-pacific-bluefin-tuna?intcmp=122


The latest data from the international scientific committee which monitors tuna in the Pacific showed bluefin tuna stocks were a small fraction of what they had been and were in danger of all but disappearing. Photograph: Getty

A new assessment of Pacific bluefin tuna shows populations of the fish have fallen by more than 96% as a result oConservationists also warned that the vast majority caught were juveniles and had never reproduced f decades of overfishing, conservationists said.

The latest data from the international scientific committee which monitors tuna in the Pacific showed stocks were a small fraction of what they had been and were in danger of all but disappearing, the Pew Environment Group said.

Fishing vessels continue to catch the species in its only known spawning and nursery areas in the western Pacific, while management in the eastern Pacific is better but still not enough to halt the decline, the environmental group said.

The conservationists also warned that more than 90% of bluefin tuna caught were juveniles and had not had a chance to reproduce before they were killed.

[Nihil]

1. A drop of 96%? Yeah, this should do it ...

> more than 90% of bluefin tuna caught were juveniles and had not had a chance
> to reproduce before they were killed.

> Fishing vessels continue to catch the species in its only known spawning and
> nursery areas in the western Pacific

Combine the two, shake well and abracadabra, the tuna stocks disappear!

[MattSh]

2. And then there's this...

Japan's sprawling Mitsubishi conglomerate has cornered a 40 per cent share of the world market in bluefin tuna, one of the world's most endangered fish.

A corporation within the £170bn Mitsubishi empire is importing thousands of tonnes of the fish from Europe into Tokyo's premium fish markets, despite stocks plummeting towards extinction in the Mediterranean.

Bluefin tuna frozen at -60C now could be sold in several years' time for astronomical sums if Atlantic bluefin becomes commercially extinct as forecast, a result of the near free-for-all enjoyed by the tuna fleet.

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/revealed-the-bid-to-corner-worlds-bluefin-tuna-market-1695479.html

[Nihil]

4. That is just obscene ...

> Bluefin tuna frozen at -60C now could be sold in several years' time for astronomical sums
> if Atlantic bluefin becomes commercially extinct as forecast, a result of the near free-for-all
> enjoyed by the tuna fleet.

Mitsubishi are actually making a business plan that not only ensures Atlantic bluefin
will become "commercially" extinct by deliberate over-fishing but relies on this fact
so that their stored plunder will make a phenomenal profit.

There are no words to describe that level of base greed without invoking the usually
over-played adjective "evil".

[postulater]

3. This. Has. To. Stop.