fish depletion

On Saturday 11 August I attended the "Stop the Supertanker Protest National Day of Action" at St Kilda Beach in Melbourne Victoria. There was a large group of mostly young people, well prepared with signs and activities designed to convey their message visually.

Today I attended the “Stop the Supertanker protest National Day of Action” at St. Kilda Beach being among the first to arrive just before 11.00a.m. Fairly quickly though a large group of mostly young people and some children gathered. They drew a large sign on the sand filling each letter with the plentiful debris found on the same beach: it read STOP THE SUPER TRAWLERS. While I was there –approximately 50 minutes - there were no speeches. The group was making a visible rather than audible statement and the protest was photographed by the media. It was great to see Kelvin Thomson MP at the rally expressing to me his deep concern about the absolutely qualitative difference in harvesting marine life between a super trawler and conventional fishing methods – the former leaving nothing in its wake.

To me an activity like the supertrawler's seems, as well as being totally undesirable from so many points so of view, also unsustainable in its industrial methods and scale and complete disregard for the marine environment. It is yet another sign that humans are living beyond the capacity of the Earth and its biosphere to reasonably sustain its load of humanity. I guess the word that comes to mind to describe this activity is 'obscene'. It seems all the more unacceptable as the ship – the Margiris comes all the way from Europe to its damage!

Didn’t make it to today’s protest?

Sign the petition against this at http://www.communityrun.org/petitions/stop-giant-fishing-trawler-in-tasmania

See also: Supertrawler repudiated by public opinion, Super Trawlers sucking last fish-stock from sea of 11&nbap;August.

PROTEST TODAY (Now!) 11 AM St Kilda Beach, behind Luna Park. See: http://stopthetrawler.net/national-day-of-action-to-stop-the-super-trawler/ So many threats to our oceans, bays and rivers….where to start? One of the most worrisome issues at present is the massive Super trawler Margiris on its way to Tasmania and set to start vacuuming up our mackerel and red bait fish stocks.

The Margiris is part of the heavily subsidized European trawler fleet, and is the subject of recent allegations of overfishing stocks in the South Pacific and off West Africa. The company Seafish Tasmania has proposed a joint venture with the Dutch owners of the vessel and they plan to catch 18,000 tonnes of small bait fish for freezing into 20 kg blocks and exporting to Nigeria for $1/kg for human consumption. Meanwhile, our major supermarkets are offering us Nile perch and various other tasteless species imported from Africa. How crazy is this?

If our government had the guts to say NO, this wouldn’t be happening. Please try to convince Federal Ministers Joe Ludwig (Fisheries) and Tony Burke (Environment) by sending emails as suggested by Save Our Marine Life-The Big Blue Army, at: http://www.saveourmarinelife.org.au For more interesting information see also Super Trawler heading our way http://www.westender.com.au/news/1342

Super Protest today (Saturday 11 Aug 2012)

If you care, please join the Stop the Supertanker protest National Day of Action this Saturday.

In Melbourne, it’s on at 11 AM at St Kilda Beach, behind Luna Park. See: http://stopthetrawler.net/national-day-of-action-to-stop-the-super-trawler/

Meanwhile back in Port Phillip Bay…

Whilst there wasn’t a peep in the mainstream media, Lloyd’s List Shipping News reported that the magnitude 5.5 earthquake that hit Victoria on 19th June triggered an environmental requirement for the Port of Melbourne Corporation to recheck its underwater toxic dump off Mordialloc for possible damage. We’ve heard nothing more since.

When then Federal Environment Minister Garrett gave his final approval for the Channel Deepening Project, the PoMC’s Environment Management Plan proposed annual visual checks of the dump site- and presumably a requirement for checks after unusual events such as an earthquake.

What is sadly missing from the EMP is any obligation to regularly test the water quality on and near the dumpsite for possible leaching of pollutants and toxicants from the +3 million tonnes of contaminated and toxic sludge PoMC dumped there from its Yarra dredging extravaganza.

Meanwhile back in Westernport…..

Local Liberal MP Neale Burgess is promising depressed local businesses that 4000 ongoing jobs would be created for the Hastings area from the State government’s pumped up proposals for the Port of Hastings. See: http://www.peninsulaweekly.com.au/news/local/news/general/hastings-port-a-goer-say-libs/2611198.aspx

That’s amazing, because we have learned that container operations at the Port of Brisbane are run remotely from Sydney, with container movement being entirely done by robotics. Apparently, global technology company Cargotec has acquired advanced software as well as 23 highly-skilled workers for the automation of straddle carriers from Asciano (parent company of Patricks who are also the operators of Port of Hastings). …….So what are the other 3977 workers that Hastings has been promised going to be doing??

Add to this Minister Napthine’s idea of driverless trucks trundling up and down to and from the Port of Hastings and it makes you wonder then what the supposed 4000 jobs in the Port of Hastings will entail. Poor old Hastings shop keepers hanging out for more business might be in for a shock.

Check out this link to the ABC TV Big Ideas program which talks about robotics in port operations. http://www.abc.net.au/tv/bigideas/stories/2012/06/25/3530523.htm

Blue Wedges Editor

See also: Super Trawler protest photos of 12 August.