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Article: The last fish: America's fish stocks are crashing faster than Wall Street stocks last July, mostly for the same reason: the sea lions are guarding the salmon pens.
- Article from:
- Earth Island Journal
- Article date:
- March 22, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 Earth Island Institute. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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After months of conflict between corporate and community-based fishermen, industry processors, recreational fishers, and environmentalists, Congress now appears gridlocked on reauthorizing the Magnuson Act, America's main fishing law, so rife with insider trading it would make a hagfish gag.
Under Magnuson, eight regional fisheries councils set catch quotas on anything moving in federal waters from three to 200 miles out to sea. They are the only federal regulatory agencies exempted from conflict of interest laws. As a result, fishing industry reps effectively run them. The original idea was these were the people with the expertise, and it's true. Fishermen are ...