Another Editorial
From the Thursday Mercury News, an editorial by Sylvia Earle
Deep ocean bottom trawling is a travesty that must be stopped
As we prepare to celebrate World Ocean Day on June 8, a conservation tragedy of epic proportions is unfolding. With 70 percent of the world's coastal fish stocks over-exploited or collapsed and 90 percent of the biggest fish wiped out, we have turned to the deep oceans in our increasingly relentless and destructive pursuit of the dwindling supply of seafood.
The high seas that lie beyond the 200-mile exclusive zone of each coastal nation represent Earth's true last frontier, a vast, unexplored and virtually lawless region that covers about 64 percent of the world's oceans. The same industrial fleets that have e depleted and destroyed so many continental shelf fisheries are now churning through this virgin, deep ocean wilderness, pillaging the resources, and despoiling everything in their path.
When we were young children, the high seas seemed endless to us. It was almost inconceivable that one day our activities would reach their furthest limits and the deepest depths. Each day, fleets from a dozen or more nations scour the deep oceans with scant regulation and little oversight. They target undersea mountain ranges, oceanic ridges and plateaus that provide the richest habitats for fish and other marine life.
Massive seabed trawls with names like "canyon buster" are deployed, indicating the sheer scale involved and the damage inflicted on the delicate undersea habitat. The nets, sometimes mounted on heavy rollers, are dragged across the seabed, strip-mining everything in their path. It's the equivalent of bulldozers flattening entire forests to catch songbirds and squirrels.
Everything from ancient corals and sponges to 200-year-old fish is caught in their nets. In a single trawl., as much as five tons of marine life can be scooped up to capture a relatively small number of high-value fish. The rest is by-catch that is simply thrown away, dead or dying. What remains, deep and unseen, is the marine version of a lifeless, sterile desert.
Over the past decade or so, we have caused significant damage to largely unknown ecosystems; depleted numerous species of fish, along with marine birds and mammals; and doomed many others to extinction.
Hunter-gatherer societies have harvested wildlife sustainably for tens of thousands of years without destroying the forests an plains that produced their prey. Today's indigenous peoples still do. The indiscriminately careless techniques used by today's high-tech, high seas hunter-gatherers are completely unsustainable -- and that's the tragedy. They are destroying the habitat the produces and replenishes the resource.
Beneath the waves, the high seas are out of sight and out of mind. We forget what is at stake, and we seem not to care. We safeguard about 12 percent of the world's most biologically important lands as national parks, reserves, corridors, or other forms of protection, but only a fraction of 1 percent of the oceans.
The high seas have become a marine version of the Wild West, lawless and ungoverned regions where fishery freebooters plunder at will. Given the fragility of these environments, we simply do not have the luxury of time, but we can act before it is too late. The United Nations is studying how to protect the deep oceans within the framework of the 19821 Conventions on the Law of the Sea. In two weeks, scientists, fishing industry representatives, conservation groups and government officials will have an opportunity to recommend the U.N. protection of the high seas.
I urge the Bush administration to support the imposition of a moratorium on deep ocean bottom trawling, a pivotal first step. We need to establish marine protected areas and ensure management improvements across the high seas. We need to make certain that every activity, be it fishing, scientific research, minerals exploration, energy development, bio-prospecting, or others, is a conducted in a sustainable manner now, and far into the future.
My sincere hope is that the next generation will look back of ours and say two things. We were really smart and realized what needed to be odne for matrine conservation, and we made the right mvoes and acted before it was too late. At stake is preventing the extinction of countless species and ecosystems that we are only just discovering, let alone beginning to understand. The next few years will be critical in deciding whether we deliver or rfail. Let's act now to protect the last, vast wilderness on Earth.
Deep ocean bottom trawling is a travesty that must be stopped
As we prepare to celebrate World Ocean Day on June 8, a conservation tragedy of epic proportions is unfolding. With 70 percent of the world's coastal fish stocks over-exploited or collapsed and 90 percent of the biggest fish wiped out, we have turned to the deep oceans in our increasingly relentless and destructive pursuit of the dwindling supply of seafood.
The high seas that lie beyond the 200-mile exclusive zone of each coastal nation represent Earth's true last frontier, a vast, unexplored and virtually lawless region that covers about 64 percent of the world's oceans. The same industrial fleets that have e depleted and destroyed so many continental shelf fisheries are now churning through this virgin, deep ocean wilderness, pillaging the resources, and despoiling everything in their path.
When we were young children, the high seas seemed endless to us. It was almost inconceivable that one day our activities would reach their furthest limits and the deepest depths. Each day, fleets from a dozen or more nations scour the deep oceans with scant regulation and little oversight. They target undersea mountain ranges, oceanic ridges and plateaus that provide the richest habitats for fish and other marine life.
Massive seabed trawls with names like "canyon buster" are deployed, indicating the sheer scale involved and the damage inflicted on the delicate undersea habitat. The nets, sometimes mounted on heavy rollers, are dragged across the seabed, strip-mining everything in their path. It's the equivalent of bulldozers flattening entire forests to catch songbirds and squirrels.
Everything from ancient corals and sponges to 200-year-old fish is caught in their nets. In a single trawl., as much as five tons of marine life can be scooped up to capture a relatively small number of high-value fish. The rest is by-catch that is simply thrown away, dead or dying. What remains, deep and unseen, is the marine version of a lifeless, sterile desert.
Over the past decade or so, we have caused significant damage to largely unknown ecosystems; depleted numerous species of fish, along with marine birds and mammals; and doomed many others to extinction.
Hunter-gatherer societies have harvested wildlife sustainably for tens of thousands of years without destroying the forests an plains that produced their prey. Today's indigenous peoples still do. The indiscriminately careless techniques used by today's high-tech, high seas hunter-gatherers are completely unsustainable -- and that's the tragedy. They are destroying the habitat the produces and replenishes the resource.
Beneath the waves, the high seas are out of sight and out of mind. We forget what is at stake, and we seem not to care. We safeguard about 12 percent of the world's most biologically important lands as national parks, reserves, corridors, or other forms of protection, but only a fraction of 1 percent of the oceans.
The high seas have become a marine version of the Wild West, lawless and ungoverned regions where fishery freebooters plunder at will. Given the fragility of these environments, we simply do not have the luxury of time, but we can act before it is too late. The United Nations is studying how to protect the deep oceans within the framework of the 19821 Conventions on the Law of the Sea. In two weeks, scientists, fishing industry representatives, conservation groups and government officials will have an opportunity to recommend the U.N. protection of the high seas.
I urge the Bush administration to support the imposition of a moratorium on deep ocean bottom trawling, a pivotal first step. We need to establish marine protected areas and ensure management improvements across the high seas. We need to make certain that every activity, be it fishing, scientific research, minerals exploration, energy development, bio-prospecting, or others, is a conducted in a sustainable manner now, and far into the future.
My sincere hope is that the next generation will look back of ours and say two things. We were really smart and realized what needed to be odne for matrine conservation, and we made the right mvoes and acted before it was too late. At stake is preventing the extinction of countless species and ecosystems that we are only just discovering, let alone beginning to understand. The next few years will be critical in deciding whether we deliver or rfail. Let's act now to protect the last, vast wilderness on Earth.
posted by Sarah at 10:11 AM
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