Din l-Art Helwa to call on chefs to cut down on bluefin tuna

Journalist Caroline Muscat launched a scathing critique of Malta’s fishery industry and the effects of European Union policies on the stocks of bluefin tuna at a conference organised by Din l-Art Helwa.

Addressing members of the fishing industry and former European Commissioner for fisheries Joe Borg, Muscat said the industrialisation of fishing had led to alarming levels of overfishing and sent traditional fishing communities out of business.

“Bluefin tuna is now faced with the threat of extinction, a fact acknowledged by the scientific community, and yet political action is not yet in place,” Muscat said.

She said that the bigger boats and better technology adopted by the tuna fishing industry, and a global market had increased profitability at the expense of the oceans. “What we have seen is the privatisation of a public resource, the oceans.”

She described Malta as the infamous capital of tuna farms, an industry that contributes to 1% of the gross domestic product by “satisfying whimsical consumer demands”, referring to the global bluefin tuna trade.

EU governments had pumped $3 billion in taxes into the fisheries sector, according to the United Nations Environment Programme, which led to an overcapacity in fishing fleets “three times that required to catch the available fish stocks according to the European Commission,” Muscat said.

“Our ability to catch fish today is far greater than our fish stocks, while the catch keeps on decreasing.”

In 2004, the EU stopped subsidising the construction of fishing vessels and instead started subsidising the modernisation of vessels. But while it spent €15 million on modernisation, it spent an additional €150 million on compensation for the scrapping of fishing vessels. The EU also pays €150 million in access fees so that its fishing industries have access to fishing grounds in western Africa.

It said Malta had been foremost in opposing key reforms in the EU’s common fisheries policy, namely the ban on the international trade in bluefin tuna in 2010. “Malta was the only country to oppose the ban to the very end, even when other countries decided to support it. Malta said it was defending its fishermen, when the industry is a multi-million euro business controlled by a few players,” Muscat said.

Muscat said that while the government pressed for fishing quotas that were higher than the recommended sustainable catch, the country had attracted the highest number of fishing infringements according to ICCAT.

Malta’s fisheries director Andreina Fenech said Maltese fishing boats were equipped with vessel monitoring systems that will send out an alarm to fisheries protection officers if boats move into areas where fishing is not allowed. “Regulations for illegal and undeclared fishing are currently in the process of being implemented in the EU.”

Din l-Art Helwa has teamed up with environmental NGOs in the launch of the Fish4Tomorrow campaign to raise awareness for the newly threatened levels of local fish stocks.

During the summer of 2010, a small consumer market survey revealed that 70% of the respondents admitted that they did not consider sustainability of fish stocks when choosing which species of fish to eat

When asked if they had been more informed, 96% of respondents answered ‘yes’ while 81% answered that they would not eat a fish if they knew that that particular fish stock was threatened.

“We are currently meeting celebrity chefs in order to explore ways how to endorse and promote sustainable fish while minimising any potential negative impact on their businesses,” Din l-Art Helwa said. “One could emulate the example given by Gordon Ramsay when he said ‘chefs are part of the problem. We’re responsible for making people want certain fish’.”