Posted at 9:00 a.m.
Accident or intentional release?
PHOTOGRAPHY ARCHIVES AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Nearly 100,000 dead fish off La Rochelle, France, last February. If the shipowner Margiris maintains that a net dropped, Sea Shepherd believes it was intentional.
An accident. A net that would have dropped. This was argued by the shipowner of the Margiris, one of the largest fishing vessels in the world, more than 130m long, when the striking photos of a school of tens of thousands of dead fish were released by the organization Sea Shepherd. Who, he, believes rather in an intentional gesture. “The regulations, recalled the organization, prohibit the discharge of so-called incidental catches. Normally, the shipowner is obliged to return to the quay, disembark and declare his catches. This costs him time, fuel and therefore money. The temptation is great finally to release all this to the sea […] and continue fishing. »
France has opened an investigation to determine if the accident really took place and its circumstances.
“Dark Ships”
Carried out on the high seas away from cameras, the intentional release of fish is nevertheless known to the authorities. In 2021, the Canadian government launched a program to detect “dark ships”, those boats whose location transmission devices have been turned off to conduct illegal fishing with impunity. “This state-of-the-art system will help Ecuador and small island states in the Pacific region respond to illegal fishing, which is impacting the Galapagos Islands and the food and economic security of its people. “, declared in 2021 Bernadette Jordan, then Canadian Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.
$23 billion per year
According to the Canadian government, unreported and unregulated fishing results in the loss of some 26 million tonnes of fish caught, the equivalent of some $23 billion per year for the global economy.
Illegal fishing and overfishing are not the only culprits. Pollution, the lack of infrastructure in developing countries to keep fish cool until consumption and food preferences in industrialized countries are also at the root of waste.
65% of fish wasted
In developing countries, up to 65% of wasted fish is due to a lack of appropriate technology to properly preserve fish until it can reach the plate, according to the Agency of the United Nations for food and agriculture.
Weaknesses in governance and regulation (or in its enforcement) explain the other losses.
Alarm call from 290 researchers
In an open letter published in Science, in October, 290 researchers from 46 countries demanded an agreement from the World Trade Organization that would ban various harmful practices. The signatories particularly point to subsidies that reduce the cost of fuel and those that help in various ways shipowners whose practices plunder the sea of its resources.
Fish consumption rates are set to double by 2050 (UN Food and Agriculture Agency).
Smart fishing nets
Is there a way to stop or at least curb all these losses? In addition to more restrictive regulations and better aid to poor countries, technology can be part of the answer. In France, smart fishing nets against unnecessary catches are being tested. They make it possible to sort the fish before even putting it on board the boats. Equipped with cameras, sensors and powerful analysis software, the device informs the fisherman in real time of the species caught, their size and their abundance.
If the caught fish does not interest the fisherman, a trap is opened and the fish is released.
More than one in two farmed fish
Since 2015, on the planet, aquaculture has exceeded traditional fishing. More than half of the fish consumed are now farmed, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Agency (FAO).