"Eliminate or really reduce your intake of fish"

Three-minute read

These are not my words, but those of Jackie Nuñez of the Plastic Pollution Coalition. She was interviewed for the Netflix documentary Seaspiracy. Ali Tabrizi, the creator, was interested in ocean plastic but uncovered the secret fact that the fishing industry is far more damaging to the environment.

Plus, fisheries are themselves a major source of plastic pollution in the sea. He wanted to know why people were bothered about drinking straws when the real problem was right under our noses.

Watch the interview for yourself because it’s just so interesting. This could be the most important part of the documentary, so if you’ve been avoiding it because you know it’ll bum you out this can be a little microdose of the essential message: fishing is bad for the planet.

Before you come at me with your ‘simple man out with a fishing rod feeding his family’ angle, I’m obviously talking about industrial fishing. If we all had to catch and kill our own food, things might be a bit more fair. But we’ve tipped the scales so far in our favour that the fish don’t stand a chance. Nothing does.

The big problem is that no kind of fishing gear is specific. You can try and attract certain species with the right bait, or set your nets at the depth typically inhabited by the fish you want. But that won’t guarantee you’ll catch what you’re targeting.

Long-line fishing involves laying out extremely long lines of baited hooks attached to floats. They’re trying to get big open-water fish, but seabirds like albatrosses can see the bait and get hooked when they dive in to catch it.

Purse seine nets encircle around a shoal of fish and are then winched on board and the nets are emptied. Since big aggregations of fish attract big predators like dolphins, and they are vulnerable to getting trapped in the net and drowning.

Trawling is dragging a net behind the boat at a specific depth. They can skim the surface, slice through the middle depth or be dragged along the ocean floor. Not only does this wreck the sea bed, there’s no way of checking what’s going into the net until it’s hauled aboard, at which point it’s likely too late for an air-breathing mammal.

My very least favourite industrial fishing method is a gill net. Imagine a tennis net, but anchored to the sea floor. The idea is you set your nets, then go away for a bit (and likely set nets elsewhere). When you return, you can retrieve it and it will be full of fish that didn’t see the fine nylon and got trapped while trying to swim through it.

Once again, there’s no way to keep away species you aren’t trying to catch. Plus, a wall of wriggling fish is bound to get the attention of nearby predators. Porpoises are especially vulnerable, being the smallest whales on Earth. They can get tangled or stuck halfway through nets.

The very smallest whale in the ocean is the vaquita, but it’s been so badly affected by gill nets in its native habitat there are only 10 or so left. Maybe even fewer.

I’m going to admit something weird now. I was a bit annoyed when Seaspiracy came out. This big revelation about the fishing industry wasn’t news to me. I learned about the fishing methods I described above at university and realised I couldn’t support the fishing industry any more. I haven’t knowingly eaten fish since 2008.

I was frustrated that nobody was listening to me about the fishing industry but suddenly Seaspiracy had everyone’s attention. But now that I’ve seen the documentary I’m not annoyed any more. Not at Ali Tabrizi, at least. His work is impeccable. I’ve read articles positing his expose of the fishing industry was all conspiracy, myths and lies but I know it’s not. I’d been banging on about it for 13 years before Seaspiracy even came out. It’s true, and you should watch it.

While I’m telling you what to do, I may as well circle back to the title quote. In case you didn’t watch the clip at the beginning, Jackie Nuñez was asked the following question during an interview about the majority of ocean plastic coming from the fishing industry -

Is there something people can do to stop this fishing net trash?

She replies -

One thing that you could do is eliminate or really reduce your intake of fish.

Eating less fish, or even no fish, will reduce plastic pollution, prevent habitat destruction and lower the demand on the ocean. I haven’t even touched on how much we’re fishing.

We’re overfishing. That means we are removing fish from the wild faster than they can reproduce and replace those lost with a new generation. If we continue to pluck fish from the sea at this rate, we will run out. And once they’re gone, they’re gone. Losing oceanic fish would cause mass extinction in the sea and on land.

Even if you don’t care about pollution or fishing, you really should be concerned that we could face a massive catastrophe if we don’t establish sustainable practices, and fast.

If we all choose to ditch fish, we’ve got a fighting chance of keeping the oceans healthy. As it stands, we could be doomed. I hope you remember this the next time you look at a restaurant menu or go to the supermarket, because we can make a difference if enough of us care.