Source: Greenpeace
A decision to dramatically reduce catch limits in the world’s largest orange roughy fishery is being welcomed by environmental groups, while they assert further protection is needed to prevent habitat and population collapse.
The Minister for Oceans and Fisheries, Shane Jones announced today that catch limits in the Chatham Rise, New Zealand’s most important orange roughy fishing ground, will be slashed in half to 2,349 tonnes. In the 1980s the Chatham Rise fishery saw catch numbers of approximately 28,000 – 33,000 tonnes annually.
In one fishing ground known as the East and South Chatham Rise, the orange roughy population has crashed to around 10% of its original size. Jones has decided on a catch cut of 88% for this zone.
Jones also announced new “spatial and temporal closures” of spawning areas to allow orange roughy numbers to rebuild.Environmentalists have been campaigning to close orange roughy spawning grounds – seamounts and similar features- to bottom trawling for decades, due to the importance of these areas for fish numbers and as the home of ancient deep sea corals.
Karli Thomas, campaign coordinator with the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition, says:”Bottom trawling is a highly destructive fishing method that has decimated roughy numbers in the past and continues to destroy the habitats they depend on, notably seamounts or underwater mountains which are home to vibrant ancient coral forests.
“I’m pleased to see the Minister’s decision finally acknowledge that seamounts and features – places orange roughy go to breed – need protection, something that’s written right into the Fisheries Act but has been ignored for too long.”We need to treat the ocean as the complex ecosystem it is – which is why we’ve been calling for an end to bottom trawling on seamounts for decades.”
Greenpeace oceans campaigner Juan Parada says today’s decision acknowledges the concerns of the 100,000 people who have petitioned the government calling for bottom trawling to stop on seamounts, but says that still more needs to be done.
“Catch cuts and closures are a welcome step in the right direction, but all seamounts need to be permanently protected from bottom trawling for both roughy and the deep sea coral habitats they rely on.
“New Zealand’s management of orange roughy bottom trawl fisheries over the past 30 years has been like watching a slow-motion train wreck. It’s history repeating itself, and it will continue to repeat unless these vital seamount habitats are protected.
“The fishing industry has proven it can’t be trusted to act with ocean health in mind. They’ve collapsed orange roughy before, and now it looks like they’ve done it again.”
“We are squandering our international reputation by exporting fish trawled off seamounts with tonnes of coral bycatch as collateral damage, and calling it “sustainable”. It won’t wash with our export markets, but more importantly, New Zealanders expect better” says Thomas.
In June Greenpeace activists confronted two bottom trawlers on the Chatham Rise painting “OCEAN KILLER” on the hull of Sealord’s Ocean Dawn and Talley’s Amaltal Atlantis in protest of the destruction caused by bottom trawling.
The DSCC and Greenpeace are calling for all seamounts within the waters of Aotearoa and the South Pacific to be closed to bottom trawling.
