FISH SUPPLIES

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 255, 28 October 1942, Page 4

FISH SUPPLIES

EFFECTS OF TRAWLING

CO-OPERATIVE LEADER'S VIEW

Everybody is concerned as to what i > going to happen to our soldier sons when I hey return from the fighting i routs. -Rehabilitation is going to i'ix the best brains of this country, e know that industry both in old J .,'' i lns " UKst pla >' a Proniint'.u t in this great problem. llowev.'i-, iiiere is one industry that will nut prove attraetive unless the autliorules will measure up to their responsibilities, writes Air. S. Ensor .Mayor oi 1 hames and manager of the illumes Co-operative Fisheries.

i'lie fishing industry is worth appio<i;iiately a «juarter of a million pi ■ iiiinuni to the Auckland Province, "in. tins is slowly but surely bein" strangled .Mis. Watson draws attend J"" t.ic need lor members of I arliainent to see that adequate prolet iion is ii Horded for iish breeding grounds and nurseries.

It is certainly up to the people's i epre.-entat ives to take an intelligent inteiest in these matters and until we do get this we will continue to see luriher depletion of lish stocks and rising prices. History is repeating itself. What trie trawlers did years ago, the seine ''oats are repeating. After the Haut'aki (<ult had recovered from the depredations of a trawler from 1809 'o llioi we found that by I'Jll it was not a (|tiestion ot supplies or prices, but rather one of markets. Nineteenlourteen found numbers of fishermen \n khaki. .\ineteen-fifteen saw the reintroduct ion of the trawler, with it the \yholesale destruction of small lish. Xineteen eighteen saw the trawler catching capacity increased by JOO per cent, Imt reduced catches and increased prices. in a few years we have seen the catching capacity of the seine boat .feet increased by 100 per cent, but with reduced catches per unit for expended effort and again rising prices. No longer do we hear of "deck loads'' or glutted markets. So long as power nets arc permitted to operate inside of a line from Cape t'olville to Cape Rodney with at least .1 three-mile limit along our coast line vye will see further depletion of our fish stocks and in consequence rising prices.

it would be cheap in the long run tor the Government to buy out ali small seine boats, dispose of their gear to larger sea-going vessels and then sell the small boats for either line or net fishing or as pleasure boats. Close the Hauraki Gulf to all power nets and again history would repeat itself in that stocks would build up, as we Know from actual experience this happened between 1904 and 1915. Only in this way will we save the industry from ultimate ruin. Penalties for breaches of the fisheries regulations need to be such that men will think twice be they will resort to taking fish i,um prohibited waters.