Journal: News & Comment

Permalinks to this entry: individual page or in monthly context. For more material from my journal, visit my home page or the archive.

Barren and invisible

Before my life as a writer and editor, and before I worked as a musician, I completed an honours degree in marine biology at the University of British Columbia.

I recall being a bit stunned back in the late '80s when one of my professors, a former commercial fisherman, speculated that current fishing practices were, in effect, strip-mining the sea. Surely, I thought, it couldn't be that bad. There were still plenty of fish, and surely all those fisheries regulations worldwide would prevent widespread depletion of fish stocks.

Then came the collapse of the cod fishery in Newfoundland, and a cascade of similar events all over the world. My professor, sadly, was right. And it's hard to know where things will go from here.

 |