Fishing industry buy out

[cdiver2]

Am I stupid or what? This artical states buy out some fishermen so others can catch more !

They can take the buy out and still keep there boats as long as they dont fish. Yea I can see this working. Boy am I glad I am not allowed to vote...at least no one can accuse me of puting these idiots into office.


Getting paid to stop working
Wednesday, July 20, 2005


The government wants to pay some deep seas fishing companies to shut down operations.
The battle lines could soon be drawn in the Bay area fishing industry.

Within the next 30 days, the reef fishing license buyout document will be mailed to deep-sea fishing company mailboxes.

The proposal would allow fishing companies to take a piece of the government's $35 million to put businesses on ice and shut down operations.

"A certain industry gets so much competition, but are they more moving toward a monopoly?" Madeira Beach Seafood dock hand Keith Gentry said. "I really don't know. We've got a whole aurora of talent to try to steer the industry from making a big mistake in this buyout."

Madeira Beach Seafood owner Bob Spaeth is helping the federal government create the buyout program.

Fishermen still have to decide when they get their letters, whether to stay or take the cash and run.

Business owners who stay in the industry will be allowed to catch more fish and make more money.

"The same amount of fish hopefully will be caught by a lower amount of people and hopefully make them more solvent," Spaeth said.

If the plan passes, checks could be cut in the next year.

The government has set a maximum buyout of $350,000 and some boat owners will be able to keep their vessels as long as they don't use them to fish.

 

[DandyDon]

You don't think it would help reduce overfishing...?

Or take some pressure off remaining fishermen, so they would be less likely to break the rules in desperation to pay bills...?

I don't know the industry. I know that very few understand that the real reason for farm subsidies is it's the only way that the U.S. government can manage its biggest resource. Reductions in farm subsidies lead to over farming, unstable supplies, depletion of resources, etc, but the current lawmakers keep going that way.

 

[Aqua Buoy]

Unfortunately this has been used in a number of places, European fishermen get paid to stay tied up by having their days at sea restricted, trouble is when they do go out they go all out and try to get their quotas filles ASAP which might seem fine until you realise that about 50-70% of what is caught will be thrown overboard as by-catch isn't allowed, most the fish thrown over will be dead due to being crushed in nets and slammed around deck or simply being out of the water.

It would be interesting to know what kind of "deep sea fishing" the article refers to, there has been worrying trends in fisheries in recent years in that they aim to go ever deeper as their catch at the surface dwindles, trouble is it fishes down the food chain into an environment where some fishes have 70yr+ lifespans and whos biology we still don't understand which makes any management difficult, and we still don't fully understand the biology of traditional stocks.

Whether this buy out will work is questionable unless it brings legistlation for the remaining fishermen. In the EU case there was restriction on vessel size, but that didn't stop faster and more powerful engines or multiple net technology to be used, so in essence having no effect.

I'd recommend reading "The End of the Line: Over-fishing Is Changing the World and What We Eat " by Charles Clover (2004) It covers a great deal of this stuff, scary reading though.

As for the farm subsidies I think it has multiple purposes, but one is to keep farmers producing even when it is no longer profitable, milk is a common case, in most industrialised countries and I imagine this applies to the US as well, you would probably pay 4-7x more for your milk without subsidies just to keep the farmers breaking even. It is meant to allow a steady supply of commodities, but in some instances, say cotton and rice it also has the effect of making world prices extremely competitive. In West Africa, due to EU subsidies and WTO mandated "free trade" rules, it is cheaper to buy imported tomato or cabbage from Italy then home grown products. This may not be a huge deal, but considering that Italian farmers are subsidised it means a W.A farmer's difference between putting food on the table for his kids or not.

The world is a strange place!