World Ocean Radio - Fisheries
This week on World Ocean Radio we are hailing the alewife: a species of herring found in the west Atlantic where they thrive along shore and seasonally move into estuaries before swimming up small streams to freshwater ponds to breed. Alewives are considered a “species of concern” by the US National Marine Fisheries, threatened by dams and re-channeling of streams that blocked their upstream trajectory each spring. Host Peter Neill recently communed with them as they spawned upstream; in this episode he proposes reasons for alewives to offer us hope.
"The state of the ocean is not good." So states Vidar Helgesen in the forward to the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) State of the Ocean Report that was released in May. This week on World Ocean Radio we are summarizing the findings.
Seafood is a world staple, under siege by increased consumption and over-fishing. Aquaculture is the necessary alternative, yet is a polarizing issue in coastal communities. What are we to do? This week we explore two Maine-based successes in aquaculture that are building local supply chains, increasing resilience in rural communities, promoting environmentally responsible solutions, and integrating indigenous and cultural knowledge and skills for an emerging industry.
A November visit to Gloucester Massachusetts for an Ocean Literary Conference (NEOSEC 2023) afforded W2O staff an opportunity to take a field trip to the Gloucester Marine Genomics Institute. Founded in 2008, the Institute is on the cutting edge of 21st century science, studying the marine environment for solutions to issues facing the ocean, sustainably fisheries, human health, to better understand ecosystems, and the ocean's medicinal value for today and tomorrow. In addition to their state-of-the-art research laboratories, GMGI is promoting technical training for lab techs through their Biotechnology Academy, a no-cost, year-long certificate training program with astonishing results.
This week on World Ocean Radio we're discussing a topic close to our home waters in Maine: the complex dispute between the lobster fishery and environmentalists over gear modification and the entanglement of migrating right whales. And we highlight the Maine Coast Fisherman's Association who recently addressed the US House of Representatives to discuss amendment to the Farm Bill that would extend those bill's advantages and opportunities to fisheries and marine coastal development.
This week we continue the multi-part RESCUE series by listing some of the most critical changes and improvements required to create a new, sustainable ocean economy--in essence a checklist for step-by-step actions toward future governance, regulation and investment in the world ocean.
RESCUE as an acronym offers a plan for specific action and public participation: Renewal, Environment, Society, Collaboration, Understanding, and Engagement.
This week the multi-part RESCUE series continues with an advancement of the sub-theme of technology. We're talking about the pitfalls of modern agriculture, examples of sustainable fisheries, and the innovative ways that we might farm the marine environment that positively impact human health and have a regenerative, sustainable response to our harvest and use. RESCUE as an acronym offers a plan for specific action and public participation: Renewal, Environment, Society, Collaboration, Understanding, and Engagement.
This week we continue the multi-part RESCUE series with the topic of seafood consumption. While more than 3 billion people worldwide rely on wild-caught and farmed seafood as a significant source of animal protein, unsustainable and illegally caught seafood harvest threatens a major health crisis if we do not confront the issue through regulation and enforcement of best practice, change in social behavior and consumption, and new technological innovations toward a sustainable future.
In this brief series we have explored technologies, initiatives and other advancements for aquaculture with the power to improve efficiency and safety as a positive contribution to our future food supply and global health. This week represents the fourth and final installment of the series, focusing on the broader view of the word "aquaculture"—Water plus Culture—the universal source and guiding influence for our lives that will nurture and sustain us into the future if we can recognize and protect its significance for every aspect of our being.
In this brief series we're exploring disruptive technologies for aquaculture, specific initiatives and other advancements to improve efficiency and safety as a positive contribution to our future food supply and global health. This week we are discussing the challenges to aquaculture, the perils of some new unmanned technologies on the horizon, the pros and cons of offshore systems, and the spectrum of alternative projects that could alleviate the typical pitfalls of offshore aquaculture.
In this brief series we're exploring disruptive technologies for aquaculture, specific initiatives and other advancements to improve efficiency and safety as a positive contribution to out future food supply and global health. This week we are acknowledging some of the improvements made by the aquaculture industry in terms of feed, antibiotics, waste, disease, off-shore structures, water treatment, quality control, and other factors that have in the past turned public interest and support for aquaculture toward misunderstanding and opposition.
Fish markets are the noisy, colorful, exiting, authentic and lively centers of any coastal city, the place where mongers and customers, tourists and workers, auctioneers and bidders go to trade in the bounty of the sea. In this episode of World Ocean Radio we celebrate the allure of such places of commerce and connection, and their place in history and modern life.
This week on World Ocean Radio we're discussing trophic cascade: an ecological phenomenon triggered by the addition or removal of top predators, involving changes in populations of both predator and prey through the food chain which often results in dramatic changes in the ecosystem. Shark, manta ray, totoaba, bahaba: all are aggressively harvested from the sea for their supposed medicinal properties and status. In this episode we ask listeners to consider this: if certain endangered species do in fact contain medicinal value, are there not other, more supportive and sustainable ways to meet demand without decimating the supply?
This week on World Ocean Radio host Peter Neill highlights the dark side of what happens at sea in the context of a forthcoming book by Pulitzer Prize winning Investigative Journalist, Ian Urbina. Titled "The Outlaw Ocean", this compelling new book profiles the most urgent ocean issues facing us today: illegal fishing, human and arms trafficking, slavery at sea, illegal dumping, piracy, and so much more. Ian Urbina has spent the last several years reporting on lawlessness at sea for #TheOutlawOcean project. "The Outlaw Ocean", available for pre-order now, is the culmination of that investigative exploration.
As fisheries worldwide are being depleted by over-fishing and illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing (IUU), interest in an ever-expanding Arctic is growing exponentially. In this episode of World Ocean Radio, host Peter Neill outlines a 2015 meeting of five Arctic nations during which catch limits were imposed; and a follow-up meeting in 2017 in which delegates from five additional countries took the agreement a step forward toward legally binding, an effort that would prevent commercial fishing in parts of the Central Arctic Ocean until science-based fisheries management measures could be put in place.
Humankind has for centuries been connected to the cycles of the year for sustenance from land and sea. We have built our communities and our spiritual and social celebrations around the observations of the seasons and the changing light. In this episode of World Ocean Radio host Peter Neill discusses this rich history and today's troubling impacts of scale, global food production, climate change, and the resultant consequences of our consumption. And he praises the recent trends pointing toward a revival of local fishing and agriculture and the ways that we can benefit from investing in the health of our communities.
Aquaculture has long been a controversial industry fraught with conflict: waste and feed pollution, use of antibiotics, escape of genetically modified species, and more. But as seafood demand continues to grow unabated and overfishing practices continue, the farm-grown fish industry will continue to function as a response to that demand. In this episode of World Ocean Radio, host Peter Neill outlines a number of steps and improved technologies that have been employed to change the aquaculture industry from a negative to a positive producer in the world economy.
As fisheries worldwide are being depleted by over-fishing and illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing (IUU), interest in an ever-expanding Arctic is growing exponentially. In this episode of World Ocean Radio, host Peter Neill outlines a July 2015 meeting of five Arctic nations during which catch limits were imposed; and a follow-up meeting in April 2017 in which delegates from five additional countries took the agreement a step forward toward legally binding, an effort that would prevent commercial fishing in parts of the Central Arctic Ocean until science-based fisheries management measures could be put in place.
An innovative company in Iceland has developed a product from fish skin to treat chronic wounds so that new skin can grow. Called Omega 3 Wound, developed by Kerecis Limited, and approved by the FDA, this product illustrates that we have the capacity to use 100% of the fish, thereby maximizing the value of the catch and accelerating economic opportunity around the globe.
China is the world's largest consumer, producer, and exporter of every fish species caught by their vast industrial fishing fleet, at a rate on track to decimate the global fish supply in the not-too-distant future. Indifference to treaty quotas, illegal species catch, fishing outside of national jurisdiction, and other government sanctioned activities have propelled China to the status of largest consumer of natural resources on the planet. In this episode of World Ocean Radio we report on the problems generated by an insatiable appetite for fish, regardless of the global consequences.
World fisheries are in crisis, with many species pushed to the edge of extinction. The current system is a recipe for disaster: demand is up; external suppliers operate outside of management regimes; sustainability seems an impossibility. In this episode of World Ocean Radio, host Peter Neill will discuss inadequate and controversial management regulations and a new approach called “catch shares” which aim to establish incentives to promote the long-term sustainability of fish stocks. And he will introduce an imaginative concept by some marine-based companies to utilize 100% of every fish caught: for supplements, food products, medical products, clothing, and more, thereby increasing the return of an existing resource.
A recent series of investigative stories entitled "The Outlaw Ocean" by Ian Urbina of the New York Times exposes the dark side of the deep sea, describing real abuses, crime and violence in international waters. In this episode of World Ocean Radio, host Peter Neill summarizes the four-part “Outlaw Ocean” series, praising Urbina’s work to educate the public by exposing the labor, human rights, and environmental abuses occurring out of sight, on the high seas.
