Marine resource Expedition Update
CHINAMoving Sushi decided to ship the expedition vehicle from Japan to Dubai, as China was not feasible given our budget constraints. It was however important that the expedition visited China to try and understand fisheries policy and marine conservation initiatives. Due to our first hand experience in Central Africa regarding Chinese fisheries, we hoped that an “on the ground assessment” of Chinese marine conservation efforts may provide an interesting understanding to the seemingly reckless political strategy in resource acquisition in developing nations. Our goal was to interview the head of the WWF China marine program about the Yellow sea Ecoregion, a conservation effort between China, Korea and Japan (who has a stake in the fishery). The interview went well despite the constant feeling that we were filming undetected by Chinese authorities, which made us feel uneasy. The yellow sea Ecoregion according to WWF is incredibly disturbed with pollution emanating from approximately 1 billion people in the surrounding catchment area, that is 1/6th of the worlds population. The major problems encountered within the system were, pollution, over fishing, land reclamation and lack of political support, a seemingly all to familiar situation. At our current understanding there appears to be no fisheries regulations in China, something that surely can’t be true. Our quest in finding inspiring people took us towards Xiamen, where we met and interviewed a spirited bunch of individuals working tirelessly over mangrove restoration and education. The China Mangrove Conservation Network took 9 years to achieve NGO status, yet despite the continual setbacks, the dedicated team continued to work for the betterment of the coastal environment and the re‐establishment of the critically harvested and destroyed mangroves. There work was inspiring and more importantly sustainable, the project has a future.
We got wind of a single man trying against insurmountable odds to re‐establish the biodiversity on Haikou Island. According to the Chinese the island is the “Hawaii of China”, but honestly it is one of the more polluted environment I had ever seen. Our
friend Anian works hard to stabilize the riverbank with Sheoak trees and mangroves, his aim to create habitat for fish and terrestrial biodiversity. The government however suppressed the project by indicating that Anian was working on government land, which was illegal, and owners of duck farms, who squat illegally along the riverbanks sabotaged the trees and the integrity of the project. Despite the setbacks, Anian continually works for the creation of biodiversity and he is undeterred by the lack of political will.
HONG KONG
Hong Kong is an economically rich country (run by China) with not one single fisheries law. Actually after 30 years of work WWF still has not succeeded in implementing any fisheries or marine conservation plans. The government spent billions on the development of an artificial reef system, which in retrospect has being completely unsuccessful as fishing may occur over the reefs. The marine protected areas have been a failure as you are allowed to fish in them. It appears and this comes from a discussion from regarding this situation, that government deliberately sabotages itself regarding marine resource conservation. Hong Kong has an
incredible fish trade, but the importation of fish follow no rules, i.e. importing live fish is not seen as food, but pets, for which there are no regulations. This has spurred an incredible black market trade for endangered and illegally caught fish from Philippines and Indonesia. Fish are lucrative commodities and it is not in Hong Kong’s economic interest to curb the trade by implementing and enforcing fisheries management and trade regulations. Diving off Hong Kong told a sad story, fish represented great species diversity, yet abundance was non‐existent. The underwater ecology of Hong Kong is therefore a mere glimpse at the potential and
the beauty that once was there. The head of WWF marine program in Hong Kong has resigned stating that Hong Kong conservation needs an economist not a biologist; his words could not be truer.
VIETNAM
We received excellent data suggesting that good marine conservation projects were ongoing in Vietnam, spearheaded by the success of the MSC (Marine Stewardship Council). Our findings were however once again rather depressing. The MSC fishery
arranged for us to visit the site and document the success of the program, but on our arrival we were met with closed doors and a ream of government paperwork suggesting that we can’t see the operation. It was then highlighted by a third party that the fishery was considered not sustainable just a few months prior to the award of the certification of sustainability for the fishery. Furthermore a top Vietnamese researcher stated that the fishery suffered from illegal harvesting, which would compromise the sustainable guidelines issued by MSC. The resulting notion is that the government may have had a hand in the certification, possibly for the upliftment of the fishers or for profit based on the certification allowing trade of the commodity in Europe. Another question came to mind was that why send the calms to Europe from the polluted Mekong system when free and unregulated trade to China was
possible, basically too many questions did not add up and the whole project, the Icon of Asian fisheries may not in fact be real. Despite this we worked with WAR (Wildlife at Risk) who are currently producing short films to create public awareness to the
lack of fish and the struggle of communities. Interesting is that the government backs such initiatives as long as they are showing a positive side to Vietnam. WAR is doing a great job working with bears (from the illegal bear trade and bile farms) and has started slowly their campaign on the marine environment. If one goes today however to Vietnam you will not find a single marine management or conservation project in operation. Vietnam has the potential to change and there are exciting and positive individuals trying in their capacity to invoke marine conservation issues, it seems that a spark is needed then a flow of great initiatives may just ignite.
Current Expedition status:
As of the 10th of January Moving Sushi is in Singapore collecting the last of the hardware required for India. We depart for a 3‐week visit in India on Tuesday the 12th of January. We have lined up some incredible people for interviews and believe whole‐heartedly that we will find inspiring stories to bring to the worlds attention. While we are in Singapore however we are trying to catch up on all the admin, articles, Internet video clips etc. We hope to be fully updated by the time we depart for India.