For decades, local fisherfolk and environmentalists have been trying in vain to stop destructive fishing by commercial trawlers from annihilating the country’s coastal seas. Now they are pinning their hopes on market forces to save the country’s once abundant seas from the menaces of big trawlers and the fish meal industry.
Their campaigns are banking on the increasing external pressure from the European Union and the United States on the seafood and fish meal industries to clean up their acts — or face a trade boycott.
It is common knowledge that commercial trawlers have long been using environmentally destructive fishing methods which destroy the seabed and fish stocks in the Gulf of Thailand and along the coasts of the Andaman Sea.
By using finely meshed nets to catch fish, trawlers scoop up baby and trash fish along with other marine life in one go. The seabeds, which are nurseries and home to marine lives, are also destroyed, leading to a rapid decline in marine fertility.
According to the Fisheries Department, fishermen used to catch nearly 300 kilogrammes of fish an hour in 1961 before the advent of commercial trawlers. In 2000, the catch drastically fell to 17.8 kilogrammes an hour. Sadder still, of the fish caught by trawlers in Thai waters, just 33.3% are commercially valuable species and the rest trash fish. One-third of trash fish comprises young fish of economically important species.
The agro industry is the biggest buyer of trash fish to produce cheap feed for prawns, poultry, pigs and freshwater fish farms.
The environmental awareness of consumers overseas and their boycott threats have forced the agro industry to show support for sustainable fishing to save its business. Earlier this week, the Thai Feed Mill Association promised to give better prices to trawlers that follow good fishing practices as a financial incentive. Although it is a move in the right direction, it is insufficient to save our seas.
For starters, the feed mill association should have promised to stop buying trash fish from environmentally destructive trawlers. It did not. Worse, the Thai Fishmeal Producers Association simply refused to take any responsibility, saying it is not the job of fish meal producers to find out whether or not trash fish is caught with illegal equipment. This is the job of the state agencies, insisted the association.
Its response is utterly disappointing, yet not surprising given its long neglect of its own role in the annihilation of the sea. Yet its point on the responsibility of state agencies is pertinent.
The law prohibits the use of destructive fishing equipment. It also bans commercial trawlers within three kilometres of the coast. Yet the law remains meaningless in the face of local godfathers with big money who are behind the trawlers business.
The fishery authorities do not only fail the country in tackling trawlers’ problems. They also allow illegal cockle farms to spread along the coasts and destroy the seabed with destructive harvesting. Furthermore, it has turned a blind eye to the use of slave labour on trawlers, which also puts the country at risk of trade sanctions.
The culprit in all these crimes against the sea is the lack of legal enforcement from the authorities involved. The lack of budget and personnel is their constant refrain to explain their policy failure. But one cannot dismiss the power of money which oils the corruption machine in all sectors of the government.
Consumer pressure may help put more pressure on the agro industry. But unless the authorities enforce the law and punish the violators — as well as corrupt officials — there is only a slim chance of saving our seas.