Who owns the fish?

[JCMach1]

Corporations, even foreign ones, are taking over our fish resources.

For centuries, men like Larry Collins, a garrulous crab and sole fisherman, were free to harvest the seas.

But sweeping across the globe is a system that slowly and steadily hands over a $400 billion ocean fishing industry to corporations. The system, called catch shares, in most cases favors large fishing fleets, a review of the systems operating across the United States shows.

“We’ve been frozen out,” said Collins, who docks near the Golden Gate Bridge. “This system has given it all to the big guys.”

More and more wild-caught fish species and fishing territories in the United States are managed under catch shares, which work by providing harvesting or access rights to fishermen. These rights – worth tens of billions of dollars in the United States alone – are translated into a percentage, or share, that can then be divided, traded, sold, bought or leveraged for financing, just like any asset.

Catch shares have been backed by an alliance of conservative, free-market advocates and environmental groups, some of which have financed scientific studies promoting the merits of the system, the Center for Investigative Reporting has found...

http://www.salon.com/2013/03/12/who_owns_the_fish/

[underpants]

1. not really amazing but still it is amazing

thanks JC for this post.

[rickyhall]

2. At this rate they'll privatize the entire planet.

I read where some dude is canning and selling air in Beijing. Fish, water, air. Next we'll need a permit for life itself.

[littlemissmartypants]

3. LMSP kicking... VIDEO HERE.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017104982

[BlancheSplanchnik]

4. backed by an alliance of conservative freemarket..& ENVIRONMENTAL groups????? WHAT???

Look at that last paragraph!

WTF??

[Blue_Tires]

11. I read stories and complaints several years ago

that the Sierra Club had been taken over at the top by a bunch of "go along to get along", industry-friendly DLC types...People more interested in cutting deals with business interests than holding fast to hardline stances...

I don't know how true this all was, or if any of those people are still around...I'll just say it wouldn't surprise me...

[CanonRay]

5. There goes one more piece of the commons

There is very little left. What a horrible world it will be.

[fasttense]

6. Well it's very similar to what the kings of Europe use to do.

A starving serf could not hunt in the woods or in the empty field surrounding them. They could NOT fish in the streams, lakes and oceans near-by. It all belonged to the king and he doled it out to his friends, family and business partners as he saw fit. Usually he gave those rights to men who would pay him gold, provide soldiers, give him weapons, swear allegiance to him. You know them as lords and bishops. But the starving serf who toiled half his life to pay the king's taxes, could not even shoot a rabbit to feed his starving (oops I mean food insecure) family.

Now we have turned our nations into the same little kingdoms. The president, mayor, Governor, congress and legislators dole out our land and water with all their riches to the corporations in exchange for money and reelection.

Already it has destroyed many communities. Take the small farmer for example. With some land they use to be able to grow enough to sell and feed their family. But now the small farmer has been locked out of the market. Where are they going to sell their small bundle of crops? The schools use to buy it to provide lunches for the students but now schools are required by laws to buy from the USDA who only buys from large corporate farms at the lowest price. They can't sell to super markets and grocery stores because those chain stores are required to buy from corporate headquarters and corporate headquarters buy from the factory farm. Most restaurants are franchises that also must buy from the corporate headquarters. So, what has happened is the small farmer is squeezed out of the market with no outlet to sell his crops to he quits.

The fish industry is now being corporatized just like farming has been.

[caseymoz]

7. A worrisome pattern I've been noticing.

The people who run corporations, let's call them the 1% or the wealthy, are pushing to secure or control whatever resources that they can, agriculture, water, fish and so on.

Why would they be doing this now? If I were paranoid, I'd say more than likely because they foresee an environmental crash coming as much as anybody else does. They're not dumb. We have a false idea that corporations don't foresee Global Warming, that they aren't concerned about overpopulation and resource depletion. Their propaganda and denial notwithstanding, they're actually acting like those are exactly what they anticipate. When they rush to secure water and fish like a gold rush, it's because they're forecasting scarcity.

My guess is that the wealthy are grabbing the resources for themselves with the intent of letting the excess population, the other 99% or us, die. That's my nightmare.

If so, don't expect any concessions from the wealthy in terms of taxes or social programs. At least many of them are now seeing things now as a matter of their survival, us or them.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

8. .

They wouldn't be 1% if they weren't good at seeing trends and where the money will go.

What do you think about the part where environmental groups are teaming up with them to support this ocean privatization? I'm just at a loss

[caseymoz]

9. Could be one of several reasons.

Taking the Environmental Defense Fund at their word: they think fisheries would be better cared for and maintained under the system. Yes, fisheries were collapsing. But a for-profit food conglomerate can't have anymore commitment to maintenance than their shareholders do. If maintenance is too expensive and eats into profits, shareholders will cash out and invest in a company that has higher profits.

Now, maybe they believe it will be different because they've been taken, maybe they believe it because they've sold out, or another possibility is, they are just desperate that something will be done. Fisheries were collapsing. Those layoffs cited probably would have occurred anyway, if not by now, then in a few years.

Therefore, maybe the EDF saw that nothing was being done under the previous system. And it makes some sense (not enough) to work with the people who actually have the power to do something.

Or, the EDF has been subverted. They're taking corporate money, above or beneath the table.

[JCMach1]

10. Good analysis... some 'environmental' groups have been compromised

by corporate money...

Also, some environmental groups care more about fish than fisherman and jobs.

Myopic altruism on behalf of the fish.