The Great Fish Rip-Off
Global activism group Avaaz is looking for help in pushing the World Trade Organisation to stop the plunder of our oceans. As a recent mailing puts it:
Often, the issues that affect the most lives don't make the headlines. This month, we have an opportunity to do something big about one of them: the global fishing crisis.Fishers in developing countries are catching fewer and fewer fish--because of massive overfishing by industrialized fishing fleets from rich countries, fleets subsidized with tens of billions of Euros every year. As a result, fish populations are now collapsing around the globe, and could soon be pushed beyond recovery.
But our oceans don't have to die. This September, the World Trade Organization will release a new proposal for global fishing rules--and right now, trade ministers are deciding what those rules should be. If enough of us urge our trade ministers to support a better system, we preserve our oceans for future generations--and for the one billion humans who rely on fish for protein today. Click here to send your trade minister a message in support fairness and sustainability:
Ultimately, we believe the answer to the problems of pirate fishing and overfishing would be a global system of rigorously enforced Marine Reserves -- areas that would be protected from destructive human activity until they can recover. You can read more about the problems of overfishing and pirate fishing, as well as the Marine Reserves solution, at our main website. But take action with Avaaz first.
Comments
Great that avaaz are moving into fisheries stuff and please do sign their petition!
Greenpeace has an alternative vision of how to deal with destructive subsidies, however, as the WTO - committed to free trade above all else - is not sufficiently able to address sustainability concerns. See our report on this called Deadly Subsidies:
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/press/reports/deadly-subsidies
In the same negotiations avaaz is targetting, the WTO is also taking forward fisheries liberalization generally - which will sadly have truly destructive
consequences, especially for the environment and poor fishing communities in the developing world. We have documented these, based on official date, in our rreport Trading Away Our Oceans: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/press/reports/trading-away-our-oceans
Posted by: DanielMittler | August 23, 2007 9:37 AM