Photo: Alamy
The ongoing dispute over the Falkland/Malvinas Islands and adjoining waters, has created an opportunity for an outlaw fleet of industrial fishing trawlers to fish, and over-fish, the rich stocks of squid in Argentine waters near the islands. Illegal fishing is estimated to be catching 300,000 tons of squid a year. The squid is key to a food chain that sustains penguins, seals, birds and whales. In 2005 Argentina pulled out of a fisheries management organization it had shared with Falklands. The lack of cooperation between the UK and Argentina has left both sides ill-equipped to deal with the fleet scooping up squid.
Outlaw fleet scoops squid from Argentine waters
“It’s like the Wild West out there,” said Milko Schvartzman, who campaigns against overfishing for Greenpeace International. “There are more than 200 boats out there all the time,” and many routinely follow squid into Argentina’s economic exclusion zone, he added. “Unfortunately the Argentine government doesn’t have the naval capacity to continually control this area.”
The Falklands are defended by British warships, planes and submarines, giving the fisheries agency considerable muscle to enforce licenses in its waters. But Argentina’s navy has never recovered from its 1982 war against Britain for the islands, and its coast guard has just eight ships to cover more than 1 million square miles (2,800,000 square kilometers) of ocean, said its chief of maritime traffic, Mario Farinon.
Farinon says the lack of seizures doesn’t mean Argentina isn’t trying. The coast guard always has at least one enforcement boat monitoring the squid fleet,” he said, and “the important thing is not capturing them, but preventing them from coming in.”
Still, the problem is so big that it can be seen from space: Images of the Earth at night, taken by a NASA satellite last year, show darkness at sea the world over, except for this spot in the South Atlantic. There, 200 miles from the nearest coasts, the lights of this renegade fleet shine as brilliantly as a city.
The industrial ships transfer tons of squid to huge refrigerator ships and get refueled and resupplied at sea so that they can fish without pause.
Thanks to W. H. Bunting for passing along the news.
Please be aware that the Falklands Islands are named just that. They are NOT the Falklands/Malvinas Islands or the Malvinas Islands. In a recent plebiscite the Falkland Islanders formally declared themselves British and hold British Passports. It is both incorrect to use any other name for these Islands in spite of whatever political viewpoint one chooses to take. Thank you and as always,
Good Watch.
Guess who’s getting some fresh raindeer meat?
Hunters cull 3,500 reindeer on island near Antarctica
The meat from the culled reindeer, who were killed in recent weeks, has been taken by freezer ship to the Falkland Islands where it will be sold to locals and passing cruise ships to offset the $756,600 cost of the 2013 cull.
http://news.msn.com/world/hunters-cull-3500-reindeer-on-island-near-antarctica