Cyanide And Dynamite Fishing - Who's really responsible?

Paul A. Blanchon blanchon at indiana.edu
Wed Dec 4 14:18:29 EST 1996


I read with interest, as perhaps most of you did, Michael's thoughts on  
the important question of who's responsible for overfishing and reef  
degradation. And I whole heartedly agree that the solution is to reduce  
DEMAND for live fish. 

However, I was rather surprised to find that the rest of the piece went on  
to explain the difficulties of reducing demand for live fish in far  
east restaurants and made no further mention of the European and  
N. American aquarium trade which, according to the figures, apparently  
makes up 50% of the problem (or did I miss something?). 

As I see it, there's absolutely no way we can play the role of reef  
guardians for poor marginalized fishing communities until we put our own  
house in order. 

To this end, I think a revealing project for concerned students would be a  
survey of local pet stores to see how many of them were selling live fish  
caught from reefs around the world. Anyone interested? 

Cheers, Paul. 

       ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
	Paul Blanchon | Research Associate 
	Department of Geological Sciences 
	Indiana University, Bloomington, 
	IN 47405-1403 | Tel:(812) 855-9729 Fax:0646 
	Visit the 'New' Reef Resource Page at... 
	http://www.indiana.edu/~reefpage/ 
       ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 



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