This story was in our news paper.
Beaching whales are giving us a clear message: you’ve taken our food.
They are huge canaries in the mine shaft and it’s well
past time the Ministry of Fisheries and the corporate
fishing industry listened to the whales and the public.
The Bay Chronicle was right last week in pointing out that
many New Zealand fisheries are near collapse, even though
Ministry of Fisheries boss Wayne McNee disputes it.
The Ministry of Fisheries defines the point at which a
fishery is considered collapsed is when ninety per cent of
the stock has been wiped out.
Southern Bluefin Tuna, is already below the point of
collapse (more than 95 per cent has gone) and is listed
internationally as Critically Endangered. This is the same
classification as Maui’s dolphin and kakapo. However, the
Ministry this year, decided to increase New Zealand’s
catch of the species even though bluefin tuna species have
become locally extinct and entire fisheries wiped out in
several parts of the world.
Continuing in this vein, the Ministry this year allowed
orange roughy stocks to be bottom trawled when it has been
fished to the point of collapse in three stocks: Challenger
Plateau, West Coast South Island and Puysegur. Three further
stocks are verging on collapse: Mercury-Colville – Ohena
in quota area ORH1 and the two stocks on the Chatham Rise.
The other four fishing areas are either overfished or the
population level is simply unknown.
Even black cardinalfish, of which 88.1 per cent has been
wiped out and precariously close to collapse, has been given
the green light. Unfortunately the Ministry didn’t even
consider closing this fishery. Instead it wants to either
continue with the status quo or make a small reduction in
catch which its own scientific modeling predicts will lead
to continued decline of the stock.
Who is running the show and pushing our waters into deeper
trouble? There is very little difference between what the
fishing industry says and what the Government says. Shame on
both!
Although our Government and the fishing corporations
aren’t addressing the real issues of overfishing,
destructive fishing methods and bycatch, ethical
supermarkets worldwide are.
Last week another Canadian supermarket announced it’s no
longer going to sell orange roughy, meaning that none of the
country’s eight major supermarkets stock the species any
longer. Sadly, it seems that overseas retailers are showing
more concern for our oceans and fisheries than the Ministry
itself.
The warning of starved beached whales is one we must heed
immediately.
Yours sincerely
Dean Baigent-Mercer
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