World fisheries face collapse

[cedric]

MONACO (Reuters) - A deadly combination of climate change, over-fishing and pollution could cause the collapse of commercial fish stocks worldwide within decades, said Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Environment Program.

"You overlap all of this and you see you're potentially putting a death nail in the coffin of world fisheries," Steiner told reporters on Friday on the fringes of a climate conference involving more than 150 nations and 100 environment ministers.

Some 2.6 billion people worldwide depend on fish for protein, said a UNEP report "In Dead Water" published on Friday

http://uk.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUKL2286399720080222

[Submariner]

1. In just my short lifetime in the environmental protection business

I have observed the planet-wide collapse of fisheries.

In college ('74) we discussed the ramifications of the Soviet Union fishing with there mother-ships on our Grand Banks and on Georges Bank. The preferred fish at that time was the bountiful haddock, known for it's superior taste to all other North Atlantic demersel fish species. The worst case scenario we had at the time was, "Oh dear....if the Soviets over-fish the haddock stocks, then heaven forbid we will have to eat the lowly 'cod'". Cod were considered somewhat of a trash fish known to get wormy quick, so why eat that when yummy non-wormy haddock are plentiful?

As the price sky-rocketed for haddock, we moved on to the next species, then the next one, ad infinitum. No one envisioned going down the preferred fish (to humans) food chain until everything was f**king GONE!

Haddock
Cod
Pollack
Whitefish
Hake
Sole
Goosefish
Wolfish
Etc.

The fisheries are so pathetic now, they take pollack scraps and press them into the shape of a crab leg and put a red dye stripe on the leg to make it look authentic.

I started school as an idealist just after the 1st earth Day and as a career marine biologist I would help save the environment. 30 years later my assessment is that we are f*cked. In every struggle, except for ANWR, money and power always win enough to get the upper hand in maximizing environmental impact. Too many people competing for too little resources with hi-tech equipment that sweeps the ocean clean of target species, and kills off incredible amounts of by-catch, or non-target species. An awesome waste that is haunting us now as we wonder why all the fish have gone missing.

[cedric]

2. Unfortunately

the chickens are now starting to come home to roost.