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Deep Sea Trawling

Imagine clear-cutting an entire forest to catch a few squirrels. That’s what researchers say is happening deep on the ocean floor, where a small fleet of trawlers are wiping out vast underwater habitats in an effort to net a few species of fish.

Deep-sea trawling uses enormous nets strung with steel weights or heavy rollers that smash everything in their path as they scoop up slow-breeding fish such as orange roughy. The practice decimates underwater mountains rich with millennia-old coral and aquatic populations that take decades to reproduce. And it’s all being done by roughly 200 ships that provide about 0.2 percent of the world’s catch.

Most of the trawlers come from the European Union, with Spain being the biggest culprit, according to a report by the United Nations. Unfortunately, much of the destruction is being done outside national boundaries, where regulations don’t apply. The United Nations recently enacted two resolutions calling for better management of these sensitive areas, but stopped short of enacting a ban on trawling.

For more information on this story, click here or read this article.

To read more about this and other environmental health issues, go to: www.environmentalhealthnews.org, www.ourstolenfuture.org, or www.healthandenvironment.org