There's a link down the article to an even more gut-gnawingly huge fishing vessel, the Russian-flagged 'LaFayette'.<p>It's longer and has only a slightly smaller displacement than the UK's new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers :\<p>Article:
<a href="https://britishseafishing.co.uk/the-lafayette-floating-fish-factory/" rel="nofollow">https://britishseafishing.co.uk/the-lafayette-floating-fish-...</a><p>Images:
<a href="https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=lafayette+fish+factory&source=lnms&tbm=isch" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=lafayette+fish+factory&sou...</a>
Unless the penalities are prohibitively expensive, proportional to the capacity (the more fish the ship can catch, the higher the penalty) and extreme (confiscation and destruction in case of N no. of repeat offences), unscrupulous operators will continue to use such ships.
Countries like the UK should designate large sections of their sea territory as marine conservation areas - where trawling is completely and permanently banned - this would be far more effective than quotas in enabling fish stocks to recover.
What's wrong with having a big, efficient fishing ship? Are all the little guys really needed any more? Maybe work this like oil leases - you bid on exclusive fishing rights to a square, and only some squares are fished each year. Big ships are easy to track. They have AIS, and can be seen from orbit if they're not sending.
With a little research it seems that these type of factory vessels are becoming the norm especially in Asia. However I’m not seeing much you can do about them. It seems like this is similar to many problems on the high seas: it depends on who’s flag fly under. That’s why most vessels fly under the flags of very tiny and obscure nations.
European trawlers have been fishing in African waters for decades after depleting the North Sea. You can buy fishing rights in Mauritania and its perfectly legal.
One of my favourite parts of Blade Runner 2048 is where they show the insect farms.<p>Could you imagine the total cost of replacing biological systems with man-made ones? We are playing with fire.
This is simply terrible.<p>Nations can't properly coordinate these things. We're going to deplete our oceans, and affect climate in unforeseen ways.<p>I wish there was something we could do.
Wow.<p>I'm prepared for seeing, in my lifetime, the day when bananas are gone: no more, done, only a memory. I'm prepared for seeing bees gone: no more, done, honey doesn't exist now.<p>It had not occurred to me that I might live to see a day when FISH were not a thing.
This thread documenting the fish genocide the Chinese are doing in Iranian waters (like mass electrocution and brutal overfishing) is also worth read. China has bought Teheran's leaders and is now destroying the nature and locals livelihood.<p><a href="https://twitter.com/HeshmatAlavi/status/1378305883399159812" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/HeshmatAlavi/status/1378305883399159812</a>
Between overfishing and climate change I say we have about 20 years or so before oceans are fully depleted of life. Children may someday ask what was a fish.