p.3 SLCC
Doctor Zerwin
11/17/10
Overfishing on the Coral Reefs
Many people depend on fish as a daily food supply, but by creating Marine Protected Areas this doesn’t allow people to fish, therefore it cuts them off their once dependable food. The question is, is it more important to save the coral reefs or to give people a food supply that will damage the coral reefs? According to Steve Connor, if we keep these overfishing trends up all of the wild sea food on restaurant menus will disappear. Although it may prove to be a tough task we have the power to stop this epidemic. This will not just happen by not doing anything, but if we do make some radical changes we would have a very bio diverse ecosystem (which is a very healthy ecosystem) for our coral reefs.We as a people are obligated to protect the coral reefs. We can start by creating many Marine Protected areas, limiting the amount of fish commercial fishermen can catch, than we can continue creating fish agriculture areas, then this would lead to the reduction of algae which destroys reefs and not to mention tourism which is a major tribute to the survival of coral reefs.Many don’t believe that our corals are dying because of the lack of fish. This is a very big problem and we need to solve it.The “bad guy” behind overfishing is technology. We now use sonar to locate where mass amounts of fish are in specific areas. According to Gills, Peter and Morley, David C an example of what happened to another specie similar to the fish is Buffalo. “During the nineteenth century Europeans moving onto the Great Plains of North America found great sport in shooting buffalo.” These were also found in large numbers, and they did not have sonar then, therefore making it a lot harder to track and they still killed a devastating amount of buffalo. My point is that you can not kill fish every day in mass amounts and not expect there to be a decline in their population. This also will devastate the corals because they will die without fish to maintain algae levels. We continue doing this because humans can not comprehend what they can’t see.
Another reason that overfishing should be stunted is it causes other problems. Mr. Nick Nuttall, Head of Media Services, United Nations Environment Programme states that,“One of five people depends on fish for their primary source of protein.” Nitin Desai says,“The depletion of fisheries poses a major threat to the food supply of millions of people.” This has a colossal impact on our third world country’s that rely on this meal. This causes the price to go up and many can’t afford it, thus causing another conflict. Nitin Desai says, “Less than one percent of the world’s oceans and seas are currently in MPAs.” Due to WWF the definition of MPA is, “an area designated to protect marine ecosystems, processes, habitats and species. MPAs can contribute to the restoration and replenishment of resources for social, economic and cultural enrichment.” As you can imagine this is a very small portion of the ocean and already has a large impact on commercial fishermen. Also, the the country which needs the an MPA will have to be heavily studied before it can have one. In the book Tools for Sustaining Ocean Ecosystems by the National Research Council Staff states,
The needs and concerns of affected communities must be evaluated and considered when choosing sites for marine reserves and protected areas. Stakeholders should be encouraged to participate in the process by employing their expertise as well as considering their concerns. Systematic social and economic studies will be required to recognize stakeholder groups, to assess the potential economic impacts of the MPA, and to determine community attitudes and goals. (Tools for Sustaining Ocean Ecosystems 4)Some would argue if more of the ocean was in Marine Protected Areas it would diminish many people’s food. This is false because we are currently in an agriculture era and we are starting to make fish in controlled areas.
If people rely on fish, many companies use agriculture to literally “grow” fish and other aquatic species that you might find at a Restaurant. Using this could be a life saver to the corals because a good portion of people would get the fish from the “fish farm” instead. When all the tourists come and visit this would be great to make money because all of the reefs would be closed due to the marine protected areas. This would make it easier for the locals to make money and have a good food supply. The counter argument is how many fish farming stores could you open? Not everyone would open up the same store. According to WWF (WWF is one of the world’s largest and most experienced independent conservation organizations) almost 10 billion dollars is spent on coral reef tourism a year. This is a large sum of money that would surely support many of the locals that are affected by lack of fish due to marine protected areas.The Global Marine Programme and WWF says that another big contributor to aid the coral reefs is tourism. By putting up marine protected areas it saves the reefs. This allows tourists to come and scuba dive. With so many tourists the surrounding areas are bombarded with money. Many locals can then open up shops, restaurants and all of the other products people are looking to buy. This is more easier said than done because our corals are dying off fast. Therefor our solution would be best because we are “killing two birds with one stone,” tourism is getting the locals money, and we are saving the reefs.
Some believe that global temperatures are what kills fish. According to Solomon, Eddie and Griswold, Marcus argue that global temperatures of the ocean have been rising which leads to the lack of oxygen therefore the fish die. Eddie and Mark are right but they haven’t looked deeper into their argument. Why is the ocean warming leading to the deaths of many coral reefs? Well a minor factor of the death of coral reefs is the lack of fish. Without fish you can’t sustain an underwater ecosystem because they feed off corals and if too much vegetation builds on them, they would die. We actually need more fish now to protect the reefs .The more people over fish the more algae gets on the corals which kills the corals. In our present time coral reefs are slowly dying. Humans have contributed much to the demise of coral reefs. Our global temperatures are rising and one of the attributes is an accumulation of algae. Overfishing plays a big role because the less fish the more algae; which later destroys corals. This is another reason I want to protect the corals from commercial fishermen because the more they fish the more algae will kill off corals. I want my children to see the magnificent underwater Utopia in coral reefs and others do too.
Although many might believe that our humans daily food supply is more important than coral reefs there are ways to feed them by not using the fish in the coral reef. Like I said there are many places where they have agriculture areas for fish. This will slowly resolve our problem because we can have fish in areas where they can grow and then release them in mass amounts so that our corals will be healthy again. This will also reduce the algae amount, providing food for the fish and the corals will be cleaner and less polluted. After this episode we can be smarter and commercial fishermen can take more moderate amounts because a million tons of fish is discarded per year. Most of the time fishermen will look for more valuable fish and throw the other ones that are dead or less valuable overboard. To stop this from happening we need to make changes now so that our corals will stay protected by marine protected areas. Less than one percent is under MPA’s, imagine 30 percent.
Levy
Work Cited
"The Coral Reef Crisis." ::Planetary Coral Reef Foundation:: PCRF. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://www.pcrf.org/reefsincrisis.html>.
"Global Warming, over Fishing and Coral Reefs - the Effects of Global Warming and over Fishing on the Ocean, Dive Site Directory." Dive Site Directory - Scuba Diving Information and Diving Reviews on Dive Sites and Countries All over the World including the Caribbean, Canary Islands, Fiji, Indonesia, Malta, New Zealand, USA, Australia the UK and the Red Sea. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://www.divesitedirectory.com/global_warming_coral_effects.html>.
Marine Protected Areas: Tools for Sustaining Ocean Ecosystems. Washington, D.C.: National Academy, 2001. Print.
Science and Its Role in the National Marine Fisheries Service. Washington, D.C.: National Academy, 2002. Print.
Waters, Hannah. "Overfishing." Culturing Science – Biology as Relevant to Us Earthly Beings. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://culturingscience.wordpress.com/tag/overfishing/>.
