The Story of Sushi : Overfishing

How great is Sushi? The fresh taste, the plethora of flavour choice, the access to sushi shops across the country on a grand scale. Some of the most popular fish are salmon (summer), tuna (spring), crab (winter), sea urchin (winter), and mackerel (late spring/early summer, and fall).

It's brilliant... until you realise just what goes into getting it to your lunch box.

According to a 2008 UN report, the world's fishing fleets are losing $50 billion USD each year through depleted stocks and poor fisheries management. The report, produced jointly by the World Bank and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, asserts that half the world's fishing fleet could be scrapped with no change in catch.

The Peruvian coastal anchovy fisheries crashed in the 1970s after overfishing and an El Niño season largely depleted anchovies from its waters. Anchovies were a major natural resource in Peru; indeed, 1971 alone yielded 10.2 million metric tons of anchovies. However, the following five years saw the Peruvian fleet's catch amount to only about 4 million tons. This was a major loss to Peru's economy.

In the same realm, the collapse of the cod fishery off Newfoundland, and the 1992 decision by Canada to impose an indefinite moratorium on the Grand Banks, is a dramatic example of the consequences of overfishing. Meanwhile, the sole fisheries in the Irish Sea, the west English Channel, and other locations have become overfished to the point of virtual collapse, according to the UK government's official Biodiversity Action Plan.

The United Kingdom has created elements within this plan to attempt to restore this fishery, but the expanding global human population and the expanding demand for fish has reached a point where demand for food threatens the stability of these fisheries, if not the species' survival.

In addition, the biomass of global fish stocks have been allowed to run down to the point where it is no longer possible to catch the amount of fish that could be caught. Increased incidence of schistosomiasis in Africa has been linked to declines of fish species that eat the snails carrying the disease-causing parasites.

Massive growth of jellyfish populations threaten fish stocks, as they compete with fish for food, eat fish eggs, and poison or swarm fish, and can survive in oxygen depleted environments where fish cannot; they wreak massive havoc on commercial fisheries. Overfishing eliminates a major jellyfish competitor and predator exacerbating the jellyfish population explosion.

There is always disagreement between fishermen and government scientists... Imagine an overfished area of the sea in the shape of a hockey field with nets at either end. The few fish left therein would gather around the goals because fish like structured habitats. Scientists would survey the entire field, make lots of unsuccessful hauls, and conclude that it contains few fish. The fishermen would make a beeline to the goals, catch the fish around them, and say the scientists do not know what they are talking about.

The fishing capacity problem is not only related to the conservation of fish stocks but also to the sustainability of fishing activity. Causes of the fishing problem can be found in property rights regime of fishing resources.

So while stopping your intake of fish won't really make a huge difference to the level of overfishing, it is handy to know in the back of your mind that every choice you make has an impact on the globe. We are only here once - use it wisely!