IN 1966, H.B. Stewart referred to the sea as man's "last great relativelyuntapped resource on earth." This ever-declining resource will soon disappear, however, if over-fishing and other human impacts continue at their current pace. In fact, scientists predict that the world will run out of seafood in just 42 years. In a study published in the journal Science just a little over two weeks ago, 14 researchers led by Boris Worm pointed out that 29 percent of fish and seafood species have already collapsed (that is, they have declined by 90 percent) and about one-third of all ocean resources, including Bluefin tuna, Atlantic cod, Alaskan king crab and Pacific salmon, have already been depleted. The paper also adds that in addition to wiping out important species, our actions are also hampering the ocean's ability to filter nutrients and resist the spread of disease.
We need to be smarter about what we take from the ocean and how much. Second, we need to actually start imposing fishing limitations and delineating areas of conservation. Instead of doing this, though, the general consensus seems to be that we need to create more industrial-sized fish farms off our coasts. Aquaculture, however, which was invented by the Chinese some 3,000 years ago, has yet to be proved as a viable solution. Fish farming has much too many complications to ever be considered as a worthy substitute to the ocean's resources.
According to the Worldwatch Institute, the world's fish farmers and fishing fleets harvested 132.5 million tons of seafood in 2003 and even this was not enough to account for the demand. If we are consuming too much seafood for even the ocean to provide for us, what makes people think we can farm enough fish ourselves to meet the demand?
Managing our oceans correctly is the key to solving the problem. "The best example of this is the North Atlantic Cod," says Environmental Sciences professor Joseph Zieman, "which the Americans and Canadians have fished to extinction. In Iceland they've managed their territorial waters much more wisely; our cod comes from them."
Nevertheless, the issue isn't just the disappearing rate of sea animals. Ocean species clean toxins from the water, protect shorelines and reduce the risks of algae blooms such as the red tide, which can affect and even kill the fish, birds, marine mammals and humans that feed either directly or indirectly on them.
"A large and increasing proportion of our population lives close to the coast; thus the loss of services such as flood control and waste detoxification can have disastrous consequences," Worm said in a CBS interview.
In Chesapeake Bay, for example, the over fishing of oysters has taken its toll on the ecosystem. In 1880, the bay water could be filtered in just three days; in 1988, however, it took the few remaining oysters over a year to clean it.
"If one could blink one eye and go back in time...it was their total lack of management that caused this," says Zieman. "They would take the oysters, chuck them, eat them, and use the shells for some other purpose. The best settling place for young oysters, though, is old oysters."
The water, which became cloudier as the oysters declined, lost its light dependant sea grass beds and consequently many of its species. Today it even hosts areas of dead air, where there is little, if any, oxygen.
Marine conservation, then, and not fish farming, remains as the only possible way of stopping this aquatic apocalypse. The researchers, who also analyzed nearly 50 areas where fishing restrictions had been applied, found that in these protected areas the range of species in the water increased by 23 percent over the course of five years. Although this proves that conservation definitely works, there is currently less than one percent of the ocean being protected in any way.
The study makes it clear that although there may not seem to be a decline of fish products in the market, these are clearly on the verge of disappearance. And perhaps that's one of the problems. Because there still seems to be fish available everywhere, people aren't aware of their diminishing state.
"Is it a gloomy picture overall?" asks Zieman. "Yeah, it is. I am thoroughly convinced that their premise that ocean resources are declining is absolutely correct."
While aquaculture may seem ideal, the difficulty of raising edible fish and the surplus demand for it doesn't allow it as a real option. People need to realize that this is a problem we can actually stop: the fish are dying, but are not dead yet. We can stop this, if only we protected our oceans. After all, what's better? To not eat as much fish for a few years or to have them all gone in 40?
Andrea Arango's column appears Fridays in The Cavalier Daily. She can be reached at aarango@cavalierdaily.com.
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