Greenpeace releases report on destructive fishing in Thailand

[Unkomoncents]

I don't know about Thai fishermen but on the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, the fishermen are the most ignorant, stupid, selfish, and greedy people I have ever met, as I lived on a sailboat among them for ten years. They invest nothing to replenish the stocks they take for free (those waters belong to all of us), they fight tooth and nail against any restrictions on the minimum size of the fish they can catch, the fought ten years against TEDs (turtle excluder devices), they fought against bottom trawling. They are their own and everyone else's worst enemy. They seem determined to stop only when there are no more fish or shrimp in the sea.

Maybe if governments would treat fishing like farming i.e. the fisherman has an area that is exclusively his and he must tend it and not overexploit it if he cares about his future. Fishermen would pay to the public treasury for their leases in a once in five year or ten year bid. They will not be allowed to fish on some other fisherman's area just as one farmer cannot harvest another farmer's produce. In this age of cheap, accurate GPS (or the new Chinese version Thailand wants), there would be no excuse for encroaching on another's fishing grounds.

Enforcement could come from GPS tracking and any fishermen bringing unlawful catch to be sold would have their boats confiscated the be banned from fishing for five years (like they treat cheating politicians now). Draconian enforcement is the only way to get these stubborn fishermen to allow the ecology, that belongs to all of us, to recover.

I was under the understanding that between the American and Canadian fishermen they had just about decreased the stock of Atlantic Cod to the point where it would not be able to bounce back.

The strange part about it is they both have very stringent laws on sport fishing and they enforce them. In Canada the Park Wardens or Rangers if you prefer have more authority than The police department or Customs officers.

I can only speak for the Gulf of Mexico but the fishing 'lobby', in both Canada and the U.S., have a lot of clout with lawmakers. Is there enough sport fishing in to be part of the problem?

I worked for the Marine Fish Conservation Network in Washington, DC for a couple of years. It was a ragtag bunch of fishing groups and commercial fishing converts who wanted a "moderate" approach to fishing regulations (they were not fans of Greenpeace). While I worked there, it was clear that recreational fisherman are NOT the problem in the US, at least (can't speak for Canada, but I assume it's the same). The problem is the corps of commercial fishermen who like to argue that "my father did this before me and his father did this before him" without any self-consciousness of the fact that their forefathers didn't have several thousand-dollar nylon gill-nets and GPS tracking equipment to stalk schools of fish.

[sprq]

Since you cannot expect that the Thai authorities will ever do anything about this, the only solution is to stop eating fish caught in the Gulf of Thailand. When the consumer demand stops, the fishing stops.

In fact, since overfishing is prevalent worldwide, the best policy for anybody wanting to stop it is to end your own demand for fish by no longer eating it at all.

Fish farming seems to be highly suspect too: destruction of mangroves in order to create fish farms, utter filth fed to the fish (recently reported in the media), etc.

All in all, take fish off your menu and you'll be doing a service to the planet.

[Pikeybkk]

I don't know about Thai fishermen but on the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, the fishermen are the most ignorant, stupid, selfish, and greedy people I have ever met, as I lived on a sailboat among them for ten years. They invest nothing to replenish the stocks they take for free (those waters belong to all of us), they fight tooth and nail against any restrictions on the minimum size of the fish they can catch, the fought ten years against TEDs (turtle excluder devices), they fought against bottom trawling. They are their own and everyone else's worst enemy. They seem determined to stop only when there are no more fish or shrimp in the sea.

Maybe if governments would treat fishing like farming i.e. the fisherman has an area that is exclusively his and he must tend it and not overexploit it if he cares about his future. Fishermen would pay to the public treasury for their leases in a once in five year or ten year bid. They will not be allowed to fish on some other fisherman's area just as one farmer cannot harvest another farmer's produce. In this age of cheap, accurate GPS (or the new Chinese version Thailand wants), there would be no excuse for encroaching on another's fishing grounds.

Enforcement could come from GPS tracking and any fishermen bringing unlawful catch to be sold would have their boats confiscated the be banned from fishing for five years (like they treat cheating politicians now). Draconian enforcement is the only way to get these stubborn fishermen to allow the ecology, that belongs to all of us, to recover.

We must all look towards Icaland when it comes to marine conservation, they instigated no fishery zone which helped them maintain their habitats to this day. Unlike in the americas where the grand banks failed and in europe where the tuna populations collapsed completely.

[kevvy]

They said this about the bird wild life 10 years ago too. where have the birds gone .

[bushman1666]

I recently saw a TV documentary in the UK made by a well known UK TV chef, Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall, that opened my eyes. He discovered the huge trade in Thailand in what is termed "trash fish". Mostly illegally caught in nature reserves by unscrupulous trawler owners often using slave labour; trash fish is small juvenile creatures. The catch is made into feed by big companies like CP Foods to feed farmed shrimp. The end product is sold to British,European and American supermarkets as king prawns. Corruption from start to finish. Well done Greenpeace.

Good article in the Sunday Times.

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/public/article1220635.ece

Edited June 28, 2013 by bushman1666

[rotary]

The BIB should charge Greenpeace a carbon tax

[pb1936]

Greed and selfishness, the hallmark of Thailand.

[Thai at Heart]

I recently saw a TV documentary in the UK made by a well known UK TV chef, Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall, that opened my eyes. He discovered the huge trade in Thailand in what is termed "trash fish". Mostly illegally caught in nature reserves by unscrupulous trawler owners often using slave labour; trash fish is small juvenile creatures. The catch is made into feed by big companies like CP Foods to feed farmed shrimp. The end product is sold to British,European and American supermarkets as king prawns. Corruption from start to finish. Well done Greenpeace.

Good article in the Sunday Times.

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/public/article1220635.ece

Bingo. The Thai? Agribusiness giant protecting the sea.

[Cardiff1963]

In shore fishing is ruined worldwide, not just Thailnd. Where do think fish fingers come from. Most probs caused by w euope, usa and japan.

[seajae]

In Australia we had pros actually shoot at politicians when they banned their coral methods, inside 12 months the pros decimated the kingfish stocks right along the NSW coast, if you fished for tuna in a spot a pro wanted they just rammed your boat and pulled a gun on you and told you to f.... off. I have sen pros doing that many illegal things its not funny but they always say that it is in the families blood, mind you some of the shamateurs around are just as bad selling their catch and ignoring bag/size limits but when you see the pro boats following the snapper schools(breeders) around port phillip bay using side scan and then taking them all in the nets destroying the breeding cycle you really have ot wonder, same with the KG whiting, you see thousands of just under size fish floating all over the bay. This is a world problem with greed, orange roughy were virtually wiped out in one season by the pros in tassie anf the thais are even worse at least the aussie bastards dont remove the babies like they do here.