A Kuwaiti in Canada uses Google Earth to uncover how a banned method of Middle East fishing is being used to trap an estimated 31,000 tons of fish per year.
Tag: overfishing
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Gentle Kuwaiti Marine Activism (VIDEO)
In fact, this battle between ignorance and education, or entitlement and accountability seems to be at the crux of our many environmental woes. Hit the jump to enjoy, for just a few minutes, the power of one woman who has taken it upon herself to help restore the Gulf’s marine ecosystem to its pre-Gulf War glory.
Last year Green Prophet traveled to the United Arab Emirates to talk to locals about fish. After seeing reports of sharks being caught and sold openly, and watching The End of the Line, we leaped at an opportunity to make presentations at schools and public venues about unsustainable fishing practices. But our audience was sometimes less excited.
Locals frequently sited tradition and jobs as justification for eating hamour, for example, one of the most overfished species in the world, and law enforcement was virtually non-existent. But new tallies that reveal historically low fish stocks have compelled the Dubai Municipality to step up efforts to curb sales of undersized fish and restore balance to the Gulf’s ecosystem.
A report last week showed that development projects like The World manmade islands above are destroying the Gulf’s fragile marine ecosystem. One major culprit, Nakheel, aims to restore their own damage with 500 artificial reefs.
Last week the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health in Toronto released the first official report linking rapid development projects with widespread destruction to the Gulf’s marine environment. Environmentalists and activists have long suspected that man-made islands and row after row of the world’s biggest this and that could not possibly be sustainable but the report taken up by such prestigious journals as Nature finally made that truth unequivocal.
Much of the damage done to this fragile ecosystem can be attributed to real estate developers Nakheel, which is behind such projects as The World manmade islands, Palm Jumeirah, and Palm Jebel Ali. Although they told The National it has nothing to do with the damning report released last week, the company recently announced that they will build 500 artificial reefs in an effort to restore the ecosystem in and around their own projects.
There’s a lot of buzz about overfishing, but navigating what is sustainable to eat is not so easy in the Middle East, where we don’t have such well-established research institutes as the Monterey Bay Institute in California.
Luckily, we do have the WWF-EWS in the United Arab Emirates, which has been doing an excellent job of tracking which Gulf fish species are overfished, like the popular Hammour, and which populations are able to rebound quickly enough to make their consumption sustainable.
In order to make good choices easy, EWS has published a handy picture guide that details the good, the not-so-bad, and the ugly. We’ve listed the good. This guide is about fish at risk and those that are not. It cannot vouch for pollutants in fish. Rule of thumb, if a fish is eating other fish, it contains more contaminants. The larger the fish, the more it bio-accumulates pollution.
And later, after you’ve read on, be sure to check out our fish recipes, which can also apply to delicious recipes for fish that are not historically popular in the Gulf region. See Moroccan fish stew. Persian fish stew recipe. These recipes work well for tasteless farmed fish like the gilt-head bream.
List of fish that are (probably) okay to eat in the Arab Gulf:
The Sordid Sweetlips, or Yanam in Arabic, comes from the Haemulida family that are found in fresh, brackish, and salt water. Their coloring changes throughout their lives, and are so-called because of their large fleshy lips.
The Pink Eared Emperor is known in Arabic as the Shaari Eshkeli. They favor reef/rocky and sandy places and typically eat crustaceans and other small fish.
The Angel Fish. If you are anything like me, this Angel fish might just be too cute to eat, but EWS-WWF does have it on their list of sustainable options for the Gulf. Called Anfooz in Arabic and also known as the Red Sea Angelfish, the largest of its species grows up to about 8 inches. They lose their bright colors when they are dead and on ice. In the photo below the fish eyes are not clear at all or are sunken indicating that this fish is not fresh.
The Black Streaked Monocle Bream or Ebzimi in the Emirates is an incredible fish. Though this small image might not be a great indicator, the male can reach up to 10 pounds in size, while the female grows even larger. The female Bream can also live up to 17 years, making it a wonderful, resilient option for fish-eaters in the Emirates and beyond.
The Two Bar Seabream is another great option. Called Faskar in Arabic, this fish also likes to huddle around the reef at depths between 2 and 20 meters. Consider that when you see it in the market or buy it frozen, the fish may have lost its bright colors.
The Ehrenberg’s Snapper (Lutjanus ehrenbergii) is also known as the Blackspot Snapper and Ehrenberg’s Seaperch. They are common inhabitants of rubble areas.
Even if you aren’t a lover of the taste of fish, it’s a healthier alternative to red meat. There are always spicy Middle East and North African recipes that will make any fish taste like heaven, even to fussy eaters.
Try Moroccan fish stew or our Persian fish stew recipe. These recipes work also well for tasteless farmed fish like the gilt-head bream, known in placs like Israel as Denise.
More on sustainable fishing in the Gulf Region:
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Hope Amidst Dubai’s Marine Destruction
A dead dugong was found floating in the Gulf waters near the artificial island development Palm Jebel Ali in Dubai on 2 May, 2011. Listed as vulnerable on the International Union of Conservation’s (IUCN) list of endangered species, it is unknown what killed the juvenile male sea cow, though piles of construction materials and half-built towers hint at the dangers marine life face along Dubai’s glittering shoreline. More than twenty concerned people attended Global Ocean’s screening of The End of the Line, a documentary about overfishing held at the Pavilion Dive Center a day after the dugong was discovered, pointing to a potential changing tide of environmental awareness in the Emirate.
Today we’re blogging live from the American Community School in Abu Dhabi, where students have watched an abbreviated version of a documentary called The End of the Line. Based on Charles Clover’s book of the same name, the documentary conveys a crucial message: if we (and our governments) don’t make radical changes now, by 2048 there will be no more fish in our oceans. Joined by Rashid Sumaila, Director of the University of British Columbia’s Fisheries Center, Nessrine Alzahlawi from EWS-WWF, and Melanie Salmon from Global Ocean, we’re eager to hear from kids. Step on in to learn how the children feel about our dwindling fish stock.
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Worldwide Coral Reefs Are In “Dire Threat”
Coral reefs are more than just a pretty place for divers to pass their time. They are absolutely essential to the proper functioning of international marine ecosystems, and to the communities who rely on fishing and other marine activities for their living. Development, agricultural runoff, overfishing, and increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are just a few of the factors that have threatened coral reefs to such an extent that US government and non-government organizations have issued a very stern warning: if we don’t fix our behavior, we could lose all of our reefs as early as 2050.