Discarded fishes from unwanted catch, on Atlantic shores. Photograph: © SAF — Coastal Care
The EU has banned discarding caught fish in February 2013. The ban has been phased in gradually, beginning with the North Sea in 2014. By 2019 it will cover all the EU’s fisheries, with some exceptions. Regulatory tools such a seasonal or area closures can help but, alas, cannot completely eliminate the discard problem. Once a fish is caught, it is almost certainly going to die either because it is out of the water or because it was injured in the process… Captions: OECD Observer
Excerpts;
The move, to cut sea bass catches from 570 tonnes a year to zero, follows what the EU calls “very alarming” advice from fisheries scientists, who found that numbers had fallen below “safe biological limits”…
Read Full Article; Guardian UK (10-27-2016)
The World’s Tuna and Mackerel Populations Are in a “Catastrophic” Decline, Quartz (09-17-2015)
As global per-capita fish consumption hits all-time high, UN warns on overharvesting, UN (07-07-2016)
A new report from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) shows that while growth in aquaculture has helped drive global per capita fish consumption above 20 kilograms a year for the first time, almost a third of commercial fish stocks are now overharvested at biologically unsustainable levels…
One of the World’s Biggest Fisheries Is on the Verge of Collapse; National Geographic (08-29-2016)
Food Chain Collapse Predicted in World’s Oceans; Discovery News (10-12-2015)
30 percent of global fish catch is unreported, study finds, Science Daily (01-20-2016)
Nearly Half of U.S. Seafood Supply is Wasted, Study Shows, Science Daily (09-25-2015)
As much as 47 percent of the edible US seafood supply is lost each year, mainly from consumer waste, new research suggests…
World Must Tackle the Biggest Killer of Whales – and it’s not Whaling; IPS News (10-24-2016)
It is scarcely believable but accidental entanglement in fishing gear – or bycatch – kills over 300,000 whales, dolphins and porpoises, every year…