Govt. allows massive fishing trawler to take what they want

[mantra]

The Federal Government has put the final nail in its coffin. Do they have any regard for this country or the people living here? Fish are such a finite resource yet they are allowing the world's second largest fishing trawler to fish in Australian waters for their favourite fish.

What are we getting out of this aside from depleted fish stock?

A MASSIVE foreign super trawler _ the second largest commercial fishing vessel in the world _ will be allowed by the federal government to fish in Australian waters for the favourite food of bluefin tuna and albatross and a myriad of other marine life.

The 142 metre long Dutch-owned Margiris will be the biggest trawler to ever fish Australian waters and specialises in the type of factory fishing environmentalists claim is unsustainable.

The government has approved the ship being re-flagged and moving to Tasmania, where it will be allowed to catch up to 17,500 tonnes of small baitfish each year under a joint venture with Seafish Tasmania.

The target fish _ redbait, jack mackerel and blue mackerel _ are prime food for southern bluefin tuna, listed as "Conservation Dependent'' and albatross, listed as "endangered'' or vulnerable'' and a vital part of the southern ocean food chain.

Greenpeace claims the industrial super-trawler is part of the European Association of pelagic freezer trawlers (PFA), responsible for "some of the worst fishing excesses on the planet.''

It said PFA vessels had been reponsible for jack mackerel stocks off Chile plummeting by 90 per cent.

"There has never been a trawler of this scale in Australian waters to my understanding before and that is a serious concern that we just don't know what effect it will have on the food chain," Greens MP Kim Booth said.

However Australian unions are supporting the trawler because the majority of crew will be from Tasmania and the Federal Governemtn says vigorous checks will be applied to its catch rates.

Seafish Tasmania said the factory trawler will pocess its catch into 20kg blocks which will then be shipped and sold to African and Asian countries as low-cost food.

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[IQS.RLOW]

Fish are a renewable resource

[mantra]

Do you think they're breeding faster than we're catching them.? The whole world wants seafood and for some countries it's their only source of meat - but our oceans have become trashed and polluted. The last thing we need are endangered species being eliminated or depleted to the point where they can't recover.

The target fish _ redbait, jack mackerel and blue mackerel _ are prime food for southern bluefin tuna, listed as "Conservation Dependent'' and albatross, listed as "endangered'' or vulnerable'' and a vital part of the southern ocean food chain

[IQS.RLOW]

I think that greenys just like to whinge and whine when they should shut their fucking cake holes

[mantra]

If that's your attitude IQ - why don't we invite the world's biggest fishing trawlers - factory ships - over here as well as a few others from China, India, US and other overpopulated countries.

Maybe the fish will breed faster than they're caught.

[Mattus]

Govt. allows massive foreign coal / copper / iron ore miners to take what they want.

I got your MASSIVE foreign super trawler right here...

(Fish do tend to grow back faster than coal.)

[AiA in Atlanta]

The ocean is a complex system full of interdependencies. Remove one species of fish and the consequences will be nonlinear.

[IQS.RLOW]

The oceans (and the biosphere in general) have never been in a state of stasis

Change happens. I suggest the greenies get used to it

[AiA in Atlanta]

The oceans (and the biosphere in general) have never been in a state of stasis

You are right. Nature has carried us 4-5 billion years on this planet with no help from Greenies at all. Nature is never wrong but in the destroying and replacing that results from extinction there is no guarantee that we won't be destroyed and replaced ourselves.

[IQS.RLOW]

True but unlikely. Humans are the cockroaches of the earth. A hardy species that doesn't necessarily adapt well but is a dab hand at changing it's environment to suit.

That's life at the top of the food chain. It should be celebrated and not used by those a few rungs lower on the socio-economic ladder as a guilt trip to get others to blindly follow a path that makes little sense other than to bolster the falsehood that is the precautionary principle