[NCIrish]

Fellas I am attaching a link to my old hometown site www.greenfield-ohio.com and once you arrive the site read over to the article concering China's seafood and their problems. This, if anything should drive us to our own shores as a source of quality and safety. It will also put some badly needed revenue back into the pockets of our hard working, yet besieged commercial fishing industry.
"Have a wonderful day and Merry Christmas to all!"

 

[sundrop]

Good info! I love the new Avatar Irish..LOL!!

 

[dalton]

As a recreational fisherman, I see the importance of healthy, wild fish stocks--I often take the side against commercial fisherman for several reasons. Commercial fisherman seek to pack their own pockets, with little concern about having a sustainable inudstry in the future. In North Carolina, it is common to find dead or fungus-ridden drum (one of my favorite sportfish) as a result of gill nets. In the ocean, pelagic fish, such as Blue Fin Tuna and Broadbill Swordfish, are nearly extinct due to commercial fishing. Commercial fishing is the only food industry that takes food from wild stocks--all other food industries produce food through agriculture (think cattle, bison, and now even deer). And due to this, there are many externalities to commercial fishing that they commercial fisherman never pay for. To solve this problem, aquaculture came along.

Aquaculture sounds great to the recreational angler, fish that don't come from their fishing stocks but rather a stocked pond. There have been many issues though with aquaculture, I haven't heard anything about this environmental degredation until I read this article. It seems as if aquaculture is fine on a small scale, but as farms increase the pollution becomes unmanagable. Another main issue raised with aquaculture is the fact that to produce 1 lb of fish, on average it takes 3 lbs of ground fish as feed. These three pounds of ground fish often come from commercial fisherman, making aquaculture an even worse problem than standard commercial fishing. Some farms practice sustainable methods of harvesting, for instance farm rasing anchoves to then feed the farm raised salmon--however, this method is expensive.

Looking at these facts, along with the fact that seafood consumption has greatly raised in the past few years (can't find the numbers for this right now, but I think it has doubled in the past 10 years) provides very few options for the future. Hopefully a miraculous new method can be found to raise fish that doesn't hurt fish stocks or pollute the environment.

I understand that the commercial fisherman is as hard of worker as you can find, but the besiege upon them is warranted--especially from the standpoint of the recreational fisherman.

 

[backlash]

Great Points Dalton.

Market Hunting was once a major business and respected profession in this country. This practice led to the near exinction of Bison, Deer Elk, Waterfowl and Upland gamebirds and to the complete extinction of the Passenger Pigeon. However it was Sport Hunters (Non-Commercial Hunters) who demanded that we conserve our wildlife and began to effect this change. Just like Marketing Hunting , Commercial Fishing provides a necessary service in providing the world with an ever increasing appetite for seafood. With an open minded look at where we have been and come from with hunting , it would be clear as to how easily an species can be exploited to the point of no return.

I personally think that we are far to liberal with the Chinese in our trade practices to begin with. They weaken our dollar, steal our military secrects and prosper from low tariffs on their imports and high tariffs and subsidies from the good OL'US. It doesn't take Warren Buffet to tell me this is a recipe for a global diaster.

Obviously, the best solution in our country would be to invest in aquaculture ourselves. We are making progress on this issue in the US. However, if the industry is undercut by a producer (China) who doesn't care about the enviroment or the health and safety of the consumer then there's no way that it will take hold as it should.

I in no way want to see anyone out of work and I don't mean to step on anyone's toes. However, there are common sense restrictions that are proven to reserve stock declines that NC refuses to hear.

 

[Topsail Angler]

I think the answer to the problem in the original post lies in quality control regulations, that's the USDA's job and they need to keep a close eye on Indonesia and China.

Let's face it, wildstocks just can't support the demand in the US for seafood. Bumper stickers like "friends don't let friends eat imported seafood" are cute but not realistic. I read a report earlier this year that stated that 85% of the shrimp consumed in the USA is imported and most of that is farm raised. The US coast can not supply us with a 600% increase in the current local supply which is what it would take to replace that 85% of imported shrimp. Ditto with Salmon and so on. No imports, no farm raised seafood would mean we all would have to eat a lot less seafood.

Don't get me wrong, I buy local seafood anytime I can ('cept when I'm lucky enough to catch my own) and I support our local fisherman in other ways too. But a "local" only supply of seafood is impractical at this point.

 

[backlash]

I agree with you TA. My bigger point would to be invest in the aquaculture here in the US and bring jobs home , where the USDA would have oversight.

 

[Topsail Angler]

My bigger point would to be invest in the aquaculture here in the US and bring jobs home , where the USDA would have oversight.

I Agree!

 

[straps57]

Sorry but too much waste for me to support most types of commercial fishermen. Stripers were on the verge of extinction at one point and I have no urge to see that happen with any other species of fish.