I think it shows a touching faith to assume, against all available evidence, that a truly free market would result in fish stocks being conserved. The measures you suggest wouldn't "get rid of the problem", because as far as the EU is concerned, the problem is "we want to have a fishing industry", not "we have a bunch of disgruntled fishermen on our hands".
You point out that fishing is a declining industry - but why? Demand for fish hasn't fallen, and fishing hasn't become more expensive to the fisherman. The main reason it's a declining industry is that we've been taking too many fish for too long. In an unregulated market, why would we stop taking too many fish?
And of course you're right that none of the species will become extinct, but that's not the point. The issue isn't whether the fish will be extinct. It isn't even whether they'll be completely wiped out of the fishing areas in question. The issue is whether, as in several other important fishing areas in the world, they will fall to such low populations that a lot less fishing will be possible than currently.
It seems unlikely to me that fishermen would look much at fish-farming, by the way. It requires very different skills and, perhaps more importantly, very different resources. I don't even know whether cod (for example) can be farmed.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: And of course, there's more to it than this...
Date: 2002-12-28 06:03 am (UTC)I think it shows a touching faith to assume, against all available evidence, that a truly free market would result in fish stocks being conserved. The measures you suggest wouldn't "get rid of the problem", because as far as the EU is concerned, the problem is "we want to have a fishing industry", not "we have a bunch of disgruntled fishermen on our hands".
You point out that fishing is a declining industry - but why? Demand for fish hasn't fallen, and fishing hasn't become more expensive to the fisherman. The main reason it's a declining industry is that we've been taking too many fish for too long. In an unregulated market, why would we stop taking too many fish?
And of course you're right that none of the species will become extinct, but that's not the point. The issue isn't whether the fish will be extinct. It isn't even whether they'll be completely wiped out of the fishing areas in question. The issue is whether, as in several other important fishing areas in the world, they will fall to such low populations that a lot less fishing will be possible than currently.
It seems unlikely to me that fishermen would look much at fish-farming, by the way. It requires very different skills and, perhaps more importantly, very different resources. I don't even know whether cod (for example) can be farmed.