Saving Seafood

Biden pitches Atlantic coast ‘Grand Canyon’ as marine sanctuary

June 8, 2022 — The White House today endorsed designating the Atlantic coast’s largest undersea canyon as one of the nation’s next underwater parks, but stopped short of enacting immediate protections that could guard the “ecological hotspot” from commercial fishing, energy development or other threats.

The Biden administration announced it will begin the process for safeguarding the Hudson Canyon — which sits 100 miles off the coasts of New York and New Jersey and rivals the Grand Canyon in scale — in a series of actions to mark today’s World Oceans Day.

In addition to kicking off the designation of a new national marine sanctuary, the White House vowed to develop a “whole-of-government Ocean Climate Action Plan” on ocean-based climate mitigation and adaptation strategies.

NOAA will oversee the designation process for the Hudson Canyon, which would become part of an existing group of 15 underwater parks that includes both freshwater and ocean sites.

But that process, which includes public comment, the drafting of environmental impact statements and management plans, and potential rulemaking, is not a swift one, with a final decision taking two to three years.

Bob Vanasse, executive director of industry group Saving Seafood, praised the decision to utilize the sanctuaries act rather than take executive action.

“I appreciate that they are using the Marine Sanctuaries Act to do this, which allows input from affected ocean users and will allow for actual science to be considered, which is exactly why we objected to and continue to object to the marine monument designation,” Vanasse said, referring to the ongoing legal battle over the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts site (E&E News PM, Oct. 8, 2021).

Last fall, Biden restored commercial fishing prohibitions to the Atlantic Ocean monument that former President Donald Trump had struck down in 2020.

Read the full story at E&E News

 

A sustainable ocean economy is achievable, new paper finds, but barriers are high

June 18, 2021 — A paper published in Nature Communications, “Financing a sustainable ocean economy,” was among a long list of articles, announcements, and pledges that appeared on 8 June, commemorating World Oceans Day.

The paper’s authors, a group of international economists and ocean policy experts, found that public and private investment lags far behind that needed to ensure a thriving, resilient, and sustainable ocean economy.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

MASSACHUSETTS: Here’s what local activists, experts say you can do to protect the ocean on World Oceans Day

June 8, 2021 — The ocean covers about 70% of the planet, produces at least 50% of oxygen and absorbs about 30% of human-produced carbon dioxide, according to the United Nations. It feeds the world and is expected to employ 40 million people in ocean-based industries by 2030.

For Greater New Bedford, the Atlantic Ocean and its coastal waters are the places where boaters recreate and local fishermen catch millions of pounds of fish, promising food and paychecks for countless people. The National Marine Fisheries Service last month announced New Bedford, for the 20th consecutive year, was the nation’s top-earning port.

While the ocean continues to support many industries and communities, it is also under significant threats due to climate change and other human activities.

The ocean covers about 70% of the planet, produces at least 50% of oxygen and absorbs about 30% of human-produced carbon dioxide, according to the United Nations. It feeds the world and is expected to employ 40 million people in ocean-based industries by 2030.

For Greater New Bedford, the Atlantic Ocean and its coastal waters are the places where boaters recreate and local fishermen catch millions of pounds of fish, promising food and paychecks for countless people. The National Marine Fisheries Service last month announced New Bedford, for the 20th consecutive year, was the nation’s top-earning port.

While the ocean continues to support many industries and communities, it is also under significant threats due to climate change and other human activities.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

US “blue economy” contributed nearly USD 400 billion to GDP in 2019

June 8, 2021 — America’s maritime economy is firmly in the black, according to the first-ever ““blue economy” report from the U.S. Department of Commerce.

According to the report, released Tuesday, 8 June, the marine economy generated USD 397 billion (EUR 326 billion) to the United States’ gross domestic product in 2019. That sector grew at a 4.2 percent clip from 2018, nearly double the growth of the country’s entire GDP over the same timeframe.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

The ‘dark fleet’: Global Fishing Watch shines a light on illegal catches

June 11, 2018 — New data is being used to expose fleets of previously unmonitored fishing vessels on the high seas, in what campaigners hope will lead to the eradication of illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing.

Global Fishing Watch (GFW) has turned low light imaging data collected by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) into the first publicly available real-time map showing the location and identity of thousands of vessels operating at night in waters that lie beyond national jurisdiction.

More than 85% of the “dark fleet” detections include smaller vessels that are not fitted with transponders and larger ones that have switched off their tracking systems to avoid detection, according to GFW, which launched the map on Friday to mark World Oceans Day.

The data, collected by the NOAA’s visible infrared imaging radiometer suite, is being used to track a fleet of about 200 mostly Chinese vessels at the edge of Peru’s economic exclusion zone.

The monitoring, conducted by GFW, a non-profit organisation campaigning for greater transparency in the fishing industry, and the conservation group Oceana, reveals that about 20% of the Chinese vessels are not broadcasting via automatic tracking systems, raising suspicions they are operating illegally.

The report on the high seas activity coincides with the launch by GFW of the first ever real-time view of transshipment, which enables fishing boats to transfer their catch to refrigerated cargo vessels and remain at sea for months, or even years, at a time but still get their catch to the market.

Read the full story at The Guardian

How to spot the secretive activities of rogue fishing boats

June 7, 2018 — The vast majority of fishing vessels follow the rules governing fishing – but many are not, and these bad actors can cause a lot of damage.

Vessels may take too many fish ­– overfishing – which is causing our fisheries to collapse. Then there is the problem of illegal fishing, which can occur in protected areas, in other country’s waters or on the high seas. Many countries simply don’t have the capacity to enforce fishery management rules. As a result, illegal fishing has become a multi-billion-dollar industry, worth up to $23bn each year. Because of overfishing – both legal and illegal – one third of fisheries assessed in a study by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation were overfished and over half were fully fished. This threatens jobs and food security for millions of people, all around the world.

The trouble is, so much of this illegal activity is hidden – it happens out to sea, making it difficult to scrutinise what individual vessels are getting up to. To address the problems facing our oceans, we need to know what’s happening beyond the horizon.

Fortunately, we are now beginning to see what happens after commercial fishing vessels leave port. The data that underpins the map above is helping to make fishing activity at sea more transparent. In September 2016, my colleagues and I at Oceana – an advocacy organisation focused on ocean conservation – launched a mapping platform called Global Fishing Watch, along with Google and SkyTruth, a non-profit that uses satellite data to encourage environmental protection.

Read the full story at BBC

Is your cell phone safe for whales?

June 7, 2018 — The following was released by Friend of the Sea:

In occasion of the World Oceans Day, international NGO Friend of the Sea calls both the shipping industry and consumers to take actions to prevent ship strikes.

The time you scroll down the news on your smartphone commuting to work, numbers of whales are killed or seriously wounded in the ocean. Chances are high that the vessel which shipped your brand new phone from the other side of the globe impacted whale populations on its way. The day the world celebrates marine life, collisions between vessels and cetaceans – commonly known as ship strikes – are still unnoticed and unreported.

“Consumers are mostly unaware of the connection between the goods they consume daily and whale mortality from ship strikes”, explains Paolo Bray, Director of Friend of the Sea. “This is probably the reason why the international shipping industry hasn’t really felt the need to solve the problem yet, although affordable technology is available to prevent the collisions.”

Several critical areas worldwide are experiencing an unsustainable number of ship strikes. The Mediterranean Sea is among the most affected areas. Every year, fin whale and the sperm whale are forced to dodge 220,000 ships greater than 100 tons, which constitute 30% of international seaborne volume. Other whale populations at risk are in the Hauraki Gulf, one of the busiest shipping passage in New Zealand, home to a semi-resident population, the bryde’s whale; in the Bering Strait, a nexus of trade between North America and Asia for millennia, where maritime traffic is increasing and seriously threatening a population of bowhead whales, and in the waters off Oman where a genetically distinct group of humpback whales risks extinction because of different causes including ship strikes.

Due to their size and speed, major shipping vessels are often unaware of the occurrence of the strikes and consequently are not able to report collisions. Nevertheless, most scientific studies conclude that ship strikes are likely the main cause of whale mortality globally.

Friend of the Sea, a non-governmental organization whose main mission is the conservation of the marine habitat, since 2015 has campaigned internationally for the shipping industry to consider measures to reduce ship strikes.

“Although some major international shipping companies and associations are showing willingness to collaborate on the issue”, comments Bray “the greatest majority of the shipping lines and industry associations have not implemented the existing measures to spot presence of whales, report and undertake measures to prevent strikes yet”.

In order to allow consumers, as well as cruise and shipping lines tourists to be able to select only those operators which have implemented whale ship strikes prevention measures, Friend of the Sea promotes a sustainable and whale-safe shipping certification. Friend of the Sea logo will allow environmentally aware customers to make a choice safe for whales. The proposed solution is simple and effective. Shipping companies need to:

– Have in place an on-board full-time marine mammal observation program on all vessels;

– Share real time observations of whales through an online platform;

– Have a procedure in place to react to and avoid nearby marine mammals.

Sustainable catch nearly doubles over 5 years, reports MSC

June 10, 2016 — A new report commissioned by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) and published in time to celebrate World Oceans Day (observed on 8 June) outlines how effective management and other improvements undergone by MSC-certified fisheries have positively impacted the world’s oceans.

Among the report’s most significant findings was the increase in the volume of global, MSC-certified wild seafood catch, which jumped from 5 percent (4,541 metric tons) in 2010 to 9.4 percent (8,821,221 metric tons) in 2015.

The 2016 Global Impacts Report analyzes the progress made by the 281 fisheries across 33 countries that have achieved MSC certification. At the close of 2015, these 281 fisheries implemented approximately 876 improvements, with more on the way, according to the report.

“The MSC was established nearly 20 years ago to address the problem of unsustainable fishing and safeguard seafood supplies for the future. Our latest report showcases the results of the hard work, innovation and investment made by fisheries to achieve and maintain certification, and the positive change on the water the MSC program helps catalyze globally,” MSC Chief Executive Rupert Howes said in a news release.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

No fish left? Let’s build an app for that

May 6, 2016 — Behold a few of the marvelous things the internet has done for us: filed our taxes, found us dates, recommended that we watch the film Repo Man. Is there anything the internet can’t do? No, there’s not, and for proof I offer the fact that I am sitting in a room, watching people try to use the internet to save fish. Fish are in serious trouble, thanks to both overfishing and climate change. Could the tech world, with its legendary affinity for sushi, come to the rescue?

The U.S. State Department thinks so, and has a few ideas about how best to go about keeping the world’s remaining supply of fish alive and reproducing. For the last three years, it’s held a weekend-long coding competition (aka “hackathon”) as a way of getting those ideas implemented. It’s called the Fishackathon.

In cities around the world, coders work around the clock for a weekend to come up with software (and sometimes hardware) to tackle the problem of overfishing. At the end of it, a panel of judges in each city picks a winning team, and then the State Department unveils the winner of all winners on June 8 (World Oceans Day). That victorious team gets a $10,000 prize and a chance to develop their project with a U.S. government contractor.

Read the full story at Grist