New England – Experts Say Wasteful Fishing Regulations Not Keeping Pace With Climate Change
Hundreds of thousands of pounds of valuable fish caught off Connecticut’s coast are thrown overboard every year, and 80 percent of them are dead by the time they hit the water, experts say. Commercial fishermen, environmentalists and state officials say a prime reason for such a stunning waste of a natural resource is an out-of-date federal regulatory system that hasn’t kept up with the realities of a changing climate and shifting fish populations. “The whole construct of the [regulatory] system needs to be questioned,” said Curt Johnson. Read the rest here 09:26
A distinction should be made between discards and regulatory by catch. Overbearing federal regulatory agency’s that are totally out of touch with what is happening on the ocean, and are now run by transplants from the for profit environmental industry are at the root of the problem. Also add in the fact that once a government agency gets involved with any industry and creates a bureaucracy to deal with said industry, the agency takes on a life of its own. In this case the agency created to “save” the industry has now become larger than the industry itself. And with that comes the hundreds of millions if not billions of the taxpayers dollars wasted in an attempt to save what was and had always been a self regulating industry. And all of those employed by the government are accountable to who? From what I’ve seen they are accountable to no one. And self preservation at their cushy government jobs means a constant state of crisis, be it real or imagined. And folks wonder why Donald Trump is leading in the polls. Perhaps it’s because he has been accountable to someone and knows what it takes to run a business. I’m fed up to my you know what with the ever intrusive overbearing hand of clueless bureaucrats destroying busi ness’s and the jobs that go with them that had survived just fine until the government stepped in to save us. Re elect…..no one