overfishing

It is a wonderfully clear expression, used by a U. S. biologist about the impact of bottom trawling. "Imagine using a bulldozer to catch songbirds for food — that's what it's like," marine biologist Sylvia Earle says. "After a trawler has gone by, it looks like a superhighway, it's just flat. Nobody's home. A few fish may swim in and out but the residents, those that occupy the substrate, they're just smothered, they're crushed. It's like paving them over."

"...For years, apparent increases in illness among marine creatures, from whales to coral, have left marine scientists with the uneasy suspicion that the seas are increasingly plagued by disease. Now, US researchers have uncovered the first good evidence that they are right...."

"...Bringing the oceans' ecosystems back from the edge of collapse -- one recent study found that 90 percent of the world's big fish have disappeared -- requires dramatic, controversial and expensive efforts to limit fishing, coastal development and runoff from cities and farms, according to the Pew Oceans Commission. Its report is the product of a three-year, $5.5 million study...."

"...Greed and corruption are draining the gulf, also known as the Sea of Cortés. It is not dead yet, but it is exhausted. American and Japanese ships were the first to exploit it. Now fleets of Mexican fishermen, mostly unlicensed and ungoverned, are taking whatever they can, as fast as they can, for American and Asian markets. Every important species of fish in the sea is in sharp decline, fishermen and marine scientists say. Overfishing is a global problem. People are taking marine life faster than it can reproduce. The world's catch peaked at 86 million tons in 1989, up fourfold in 50 years. But many governments, including the United States, Mexico, the European Union, Japan and China, kept on pouring subsidies into commercial fishing fleets to keep them afloat. Crucial fisheries have collapsed worldwide..."