|
In today's "Die Burger" newspaper, one of the headlines is about the shock announcement by the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism to put a total moratorium on the harvesting of abalone for an unspecified period of time. (see article below posting in Afrikaans)
Subsistence fishers have raised their voices against this in anger and frustration and says that this measure will take food off the table for many fishermen depending for their income on the harvesting of abalone. According to DE&T they have planned for this eventuality by means of a strategy in partnership with the Department of Labour to develop sustainable abalone farms that will replace the 800 job opportunities that will get lost because of the moratorium. This sounds good, but no doubt there will be a time discrepancy, with the fishermen losing their income within the next two weeks and the new abalone farms still only a plan on paper.
According to Minister Martinus van Schalkwyk, minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, the source is heavily over-exploited and on the brink of collapse. This is the combined result of over-exploitation, poaching and the changed migration route of the West Coast crayfish due to climate change. The crayfish eats the sea anemones that provides protection to the young and vulnerable abalone.
Traffic, an organisation for trade in natural food resources, has made a statement saying that the removal of fishermen from the scene only leaves more room for poachers. The World Wildlife Foundation has welcomed the measure, but said it is concerned about the capacity to enforce the moratorium, if there is not enough manpower to enforce it, the moratorium will mean very little.
In a bid to save their own abalone population, a moratorium has earlier been placed on the harvesting of abalone for a period of 10 years by North America. Abalone resources in Japan and New Zealand are also under threat.
Surely this must be one of the best examples of how Homo Sapiens destroys its food resources. Not only was the resource over-exploited, but an additional impact of climate change, caused by pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, has worsened the situation.
From Namibia we hear about over-exploitation of fire-wood resources and polluted dams.
Environmental bad news seem to have become a bit like murder and crime. We hear about it so often and the realisation that so much needs to change for it to be halted causes a numbness and inability to really act.
In the meantime,research, published in the latest issue of Proceedings of the Royal Society B., was carried out by University of York student Gareth Jenkins, together with his supervisor, Dr Peter Mayhew, and University of Leeds Professor Tim Benton, both of whom are population ecologists. This claims that the fossil record supports evidence for an impemping mass extinction in the coming century.(see http://www.york.ac.uk/admin/presspr/pressreleases/massextinctions.htm) or go to http://www.eurekalert.org and click on Atmospheric Science and scroll down until you find the article. It seems that climate change, directly or indirectly, was the cause for most of past five mass extinction waves to hit the earth. (By the way, http://www.eurekalert.org is a great website for keeping track of the newest scientific news - it is updated on a daily basis)
The problem of course, just like the abalone resource's near-collapse, is that "the coming century" sounds like we have lots of time. So it was with the abalone, most people thought that there is still much room for harvesting or even denied that the resource will ever collapse. And then, suddenly, it did.
________________________________________________
SKOK TREF SA SE VISSERS
ANESCA SMITH
25/10/2007 11:50:15 PM - (SA)
KAAPSTAD. – ’n Perlemoenskok wat ’n groot invloed kan hê op die toekoms van veral bestaansvissers, het die land getref.
Oor minder as ’n week mag niemand meer perlemoen uit die see haal op enige plek in Suid-Afrika nie, het die regering gister in ’n skok-aankondiging bekend gemaak. Die kommersiële perlemoenbedryf sal van 1 November vir ’n onbepaalde tydperk gesluit word terwyl meer geld egter belê gaan word in die kweek daarvan op perlemoenplase.
Bekommerde bestaansvissers het nadat die nuus gister bekend geword het, hul woede en frustrasie laat blyk oor die besluit. Veral broodwinners wat al lank ’n bestaan uit die perlemoenbedryf maak, weet nie hoe hulle nou kos op die tafel vir hul gesinne gaan sit nie.
Die perlemoenbron huiwer op die rand van ineenstorting weens onbeheerste stropery en die suidwaartse migrasie van Weskus-kreef weens klimaatsverandering. Die kreef verorber see-anemone wat skuiling bied aan jong, weerlose perlemoen.
“Hierdie was ’n moeilike besluit, maar sal verseker dat die bron oorleef en dat toekomstige geslagte weet wat perlemoen is,” het die minister van omgewingsake en toerisme, mnr. Marthinus van Schalkwyk, gister gesê.
Ernstige vrese oor die uitwerking op vissergemeenskappe is uitgespreek, maar die departement het in ’n verklaring die versekering gegee dat hy reeds ’n maatskaplike plan in samewerking met die departement van arbeid het om die geraamde 800 werkgeleenthede wat nou verlore is, teen te werk. Die strategie sluit in die ontwikkeling van volhoubare perlemoenplase. Bykomende permitte gaan ook uitgereik word vir walvis-kykery en om in hokke saam met haaie te duik.
Min vertroue bestaan onder omgewingskenners en opposisiepartye dat die bron werklik kans gaan kry om te herstel terwyl stropery onbeheersd voortduur.
“Met wettige perlemoenvissers uit die pad, bly daar net meer oor vir stropers,” het mnr. Markus Burgener van Traffic, ’n organisasie wat handel in natuurbronne monitor, gesê.
Die bewaringsgroep WWF-SA het gesê hulle verwelkom die erns waarmee die minister die kwessie benader. Hy het uitgewys wetgewing is slegs een been van ’n omvattende strategie wat benodig word om volhoubaarheid te verseker.
“Wetstoepassing moet langs die kus sowel as by doeane-punte verskerp word. Deur bloot die bedryf te sluit sonder ’n omvattende plan sal slegs diegene straf wat reeds voldoen (aan die wet).”
Van Schalkwyk het in 2004 reeds gesê dat sodanige opskorting van kommersiële perlemoenvangste ’n moontlikheid is. “Die afgelope paar jaar waarsku navorsers al dat dié vissery in ’n krisis is,” het hy gister gesê. “Ons het nou die punt bereik waar die totale toelaatbare vangs ’n rekord-laagtepunt van 125 ton vir die 2006-’07 seisoen bereik het.” Tussen 1970 en 1995 was dit konstant tussen 600 en 700 ton per jaar, voordat dit verminder moes word.
Volgens die departement se woordvoerder, mnr. Mava Scott, is daar altesame 253 duikers met permitte en ’n verdere 40 beslote korporasies wat altesame 800 werkgeleenthede voorsien, onder andere in die Kaapse Metropool en aan die Weskus.
In Noord-Amerika is die perlemoenbedryf reeds tien jaar lank gesluit. Dit word ook bedreig in lande soos Japan, Australië en Nieu-Seeland.
|
The worst case of over utilising a resource is here in eastern Canada (codfish) in my opinion we at one time had the worlds richest ocean .They said when John Cabot came here he could just lower baskets over he side of his boat and fill them with cod.
In my life time of 25 years as a fishing captain I've seen it going from being able to catch 100,000 lb in a day to not being able to catch that amount in a year.
I'M NOT SO SURE T WAS OVER UTILISING , its totally mismanagement. As historically our ocean kept much more fishermen happy and their families fed. When simple fishing technology was the way we had no decline in our oceans resources. THEN CAME TRAWLERS and BEURACRATES who had all power and no real knowledge over the period of time. |
Dear Dwayne, I'm not so sure what exactly you mean when you say that it is not over utilisation that caused the decline and even collapse of fishing resources, but trawlers and bureaucrats and that it was better when "simple fishing technologies" was used. I agree that mismanagement plays a big role - but usually does so by a lack of 1) proper management policies and rules and 2) the enforcement of those rules and regulations and 3) the effective policing of areas that are vulnerable.
I think that the oceans, by their very nature, are hard to police, but that catches (including that of the trawlers of big companies and individuals) can be monitored when they offload. In the end, though, the trawlers catch the fish because consumers have created a demand. It is still over utilisation - because too much is caught.
By "simple fishing technologies" I assume you mean subsistence fishing or fishing for sport with low technology (like handlines and small nets)? Sure, when only that kind of fishing was still done, there might have been less danger to resources, but then again, there were less people then. Now there are more than 6 billion mouths to feed on the planet. And in a ironic twist of good intentions, the eating of fish as a healthier alternative to red meat, is probably increasing the demand even more.....
My own personal feeling is that we are starting to learn some lessons the hard way and that there will be more of these lessons to come. We have virtually destroyed a food resource of ours - abalone - and now will have to go without it for a long time to give the abalone population a chance to recover and stabilise. Abalone used to be a "poor man's food", with many subsistence fishermen and their families relying on it in lean times. As it became scarcer and scarcer, it became a luxury item, selling for enormously high prices and with poachers relentlessly overharvesting to rake in ever more money on the black market.
No matter from what angle you look at the problem, it still seems to be a matter of the problem being caused by using too much of a limited resource.
|
|
|
|
