This fish thing is so silly! If a trawler goes to Sea and catches two types of fish in the nets, one type may be over quota and the other, not so. The fish must be separated out and the non quota kept in the hold, while the other, over quota fish, is thrown over the side, mostly dead.
I can understand quotas. If you only catch so many tonnes of a type, then you leave some to breed. But how does it help breeding, to throw back dead ones??? If a skipper tries to land them, he can be heavily fined. Some cross deck them, at Sea, to a smaller boat, which lands them, away from the normal harbours. This is a dodgy business and is, in fact, criminal, but very lucrative.
Rules constantly come out to make nets have a certain aperture of holes in them. Then types of different sizes and the young fish can escape. This is a pretty good idea, but the move the goalpost, constantly. Nets can cost a lot of money to replace with different sizes.
If a trawler deliberately fishes over quota by going to regular areas where fish of that type are,then, by all means, fine him. However, if a boat goes out to a specific area, to catch a type of fish and accidentally catches two types, they should be landed in my view..
By dumping them, of course, the price stays stable, which is more likely to be the real reason for quotas, rather than fish conservation.
No comments:
Post a Comment