BAN ON BRUTAL FISHING BLOCKED

[Anonymous]

Ban on ‘brutal’ fishing blocked
United
Nations negotiations on fisheries have ended without a global ban on
trawling methods which destroy coral reefs and fish nurseries.
Conservation
groups and some governments had argued for a ban on bottom-trawling,
which drags heavy nets and crushing rollers on the sea
floor.Negotiators could only agree on a limited set of precautionary
measures.Last month, leading scientists warned there would be no sea
fish left in 50 years if current practices continued.Negotiations at
the UN in New York aimed to secure an agreement to go before the
General Assembly next month.

Slow growth
Central
to discussions was bottom-trawling, widely regarded as a destructive
fishing practice.It targets slow-growing species such as orange roughy,
which take decades to reach breeding age. Such species are especially
vulnerable to overfishing because the population replenishes itself
very slowly.For three years, conservation groups have been pushing for
a UN moratorium on bottom-trawling; for the third year running, they
have been disappointed.”We had been hoping the amazing creatures and
habitats of the deep sea would get an early Christmas present this
week,” said Bryce Beukers-Stewart, fisheries policy officer with the
Marine Conservation Society.”But once again, short-term political and
economic interests have over-ridden common sense.”

Bottoming out
Eleven
nations have bottom-trawling fleets, with Spain’s being the biggest.
Studies have indicated that none would be commercially viable without
government subsidies.In 2004, a report compiled for the World
Conservation Union (IUCN) and other environmental groups concluded that
bottom-trawling was “…highly destructive to the biodiversity
associated with seamounts and deep-sea coral ecosystems and… likely
to pose significant risks to this biodiversity, including the risk of
species extinction.”In the same year, 1,100 scientists put their names
to a petition supporting the demand for a moratorium.All this
scientific evidence could not convince enough UN delegates that a
moratorium was needed.The eventual deal which goes forward to the
General Assembly mandates governments to adopt unilateral
“precautionary measures” to ensure their bottom-trawlers do not cause
significant damage to marine ecosystems.In areas covered by Regional
Fisheries Management Organisations (RFMOs), “precautionary measures”
must be established by the end of 2008.”The final agreement has more
loopholes in it than a fisherman’s sweater,” fumed Greenpeace oceans
policy advisor Karen Sack.Conservation groups accused Iceland in
particular of blocking further protection. Iceland is already under
fire from the conservation lobby over its recent decision to resume
commercial whaling.”The international community should be outraged that
Iceland could almost single-handedly sink deep-sea protection and the
food security of future generations,” said Ms Sack.Last month, an
international team of scientists, having compiled a vast range of data
from a wide variety of sources, warned that at current rates of
depletion, there would be no viable populations of fish left in the
seas by the middle of the century. 

[Author]

November 28, 2006 at 11:11 AM