on Nov 24th, 2006
Ban on ‘brutal’ fishing blocked
From BBC News site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6181396.stm
According to the BBC news website, 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.
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.
Read the full article on at the BBC wesbite.
I will never forget the first time I saw the picture of the full net of fish, where all you could see was the eyes bulging out of their sockets, through the net. I felt sick, the seas are totally unprotected and I do not think it will take 50 years to devastate our oceans, along with the effects of global warming, it’s happening already. They are poisoned with heavy metals from our waste which is dumped without thought into the seas. I daren’t think too much about it as it is so mindless and awful, and unnecessary when so much is pulped for fish or animal feed. Who says humans are top of the heap? Ann.