The current and future states of the world's fishing industry were discussed in Portsmouth, N.H. on Monday, Sept. 29. Entitled "Fishing Into the Future: Challenge of Supply, Demand, and the Environment," the talk was billed for an intended audience of fishermen, scientists, seafood suppliers and consumers.
The speaker for the event was Philip MacMullen, head of the Environment at Sea Fish Industry Authority, a company in the U.K. more commonly known as Seafish. According to the company's website, Seafish "works across all sectors of the U.K. seafood industry to promote good quality, sustainable seafood."
The talk was sponsored by the Northeast Consortium, a joint effort between four research institutions in New England, including UNH, which brings fishermen and scientists together for cooperative research and monitoring projects as well as the Yankee Fishermen's Cooperative based in Seabrook, N.H. The choice of MacMullen as speaker seemed appropriate when he explained it is "probably the case that the U.K. is leading the world right now" in terms of the sustainability of their fishing industry.
One of MacMullen's primary objectives was to address the negative press that often surrounds the seafood industry when it comes to the environment. Regarding the industry, he said, "Things seem to be stable, fish supplies are relatively strong, and yet the headlines don't reflect that."
MacMullen said headlines often can be linked back to press releases from environmental groups, and he specifically mentioned Greenpeace. A visit to Greenpeace's website confirmed this. The beginning of an article regarding fishing reads: "Our oceans are in crisis. Massive factory fishing ships are using state-of-the-art technology to target one species of fish at a time, until that population collapses, and then they turn to another species for profit."
However, MacMullen showed several graphs which showed a distinctly different view that the world's fish supplies have remained stable over the last few decades. Of the various fish stocks, 65 percent are operating at full exploitation, which means that fishermen are harvesting the maximum sustainable yield for that stock. Only 20 percent are being overexploited, with the remainder underexploited.
"I'm not in denial. There are some big problems with some fish stocks," said MacMullen, but overall he said the global fishing situation is positive for the most part.
The demands brought on by environmental groups, along with increasing fuel costs, mean changing times for the fishing industry. It is seeing the convergence of conservation and commerce when it comes to policy. Energy intensive fishing methods, such as beam trawling, are "under increasing pressure."
MacMullen said "fishing has to be ready to defend its interests."
MacMullen's strategy is to "make the industry part of the solution." One example of this is Seafish's "Responsible Fishing Scheme." The company's website said that the program "is an independent, audited assessment of the application of good practice by a vessel skipper and crew in their fishing operations" that gives "assurance to the supply chain that fish from the vessel has been caught responsibly."
These fishing practices ensure that the industry can continue producing in the future. MacMullen predicted future increases in population would result in the demand for fish, outpacing the supply "almost certainly."
Several times throughout the evening, the floor was open for questions, which made the event seem more like the advertised "discussion." The crowd asked diverse questions regarding topics such as sport fishing, aquaculture and whether consumers would pay more for fish harvested sustainably.
Ken La Valley, a scientist with the NH Sea Grant and UNH Cooperative Extension, who introduced MacMullen at the event, thought "the evening was a great success," with about 50 people in attendance.
"Having Philip speak was a great opportunity for NH to begin the discussion of sustainable harvest, best management practices and the medias influence on the publics perception of the fishing industry," he wrote in an e-mail.
The talk was part of a program intended "to educate the public on what the fishing industry has been doing to sustain fishing stocks over the past ten years as research partners with academia. It's important to dispel the perception that fishermen exhaust the resource without any thought of the future."
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