Hundreds of fishing fleets that go 'dark' suspected of illegal hunting, study finds

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

Hundreds of fishing fleets that go ‘dark’ suspected of illegal hunting, study finds

Vessels primarily from China switch off their tracking beacons to evade detection while they engage in possible illegal fishing

Uki Goñi in Buenos Aires
Wed 2 Jun 2021 10.00 BST

Giant distant-water fishing fleets, primarily from China, are switching off their tracking beacons to evade detection while they engage in a possibly illegal hunt for squid and other lucrative species on the very edge of Argentina’s extensive fishing grounds, according to a new study by Oceana, an international NGO dedicated to ocean conservation.

Every year, vessels crowd together along the limits of Argentina’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) to take advantage of the lucrative fishing grounds.

By monitoring the ships’ tracking beacons between January 2018 and April 2021, Oceana, found that more than 800 vessels apparently conducted nearly 900,000 hours of fishing within 20 nautical miles of the invisible border between Argentina’s national waters and the high seas.

“During this three-and-a-half-year period, there were over 6,000 instances in which these fishing vessels appeared to go ‘dark’ by potentially disabling their electronic tracking devices, known as Automatic Identification Systems (AIS),” says the report, published on Wednesday, titled, Now You See Me, Now You Don’t: Vanishing Vessels Along Argentina’s Waters.

In all, these vessels were “hidden” for over 600,000 hours during which Oceana suspects they crossed over into Argentina’s territorial waters for illegal fishing.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jun/02/fishing-fleets-go-dark-suspected-illegal-hunting-study

[Judi Lynn]

1. This is getting crazier & crazier. It must mean they have vaporized fish numbers near China alrea!

Chile keeps eye on Chinese fishing fleet along South American coast
OCTOBER 8, 20203:50 PMUPDATED 4 HOURS AGO

By Natalia A. Ramos Miranda
2 MIN READ


SANTIAGO (Reuters) - The Chilean government is keeping close tabs on a large fleet of Chinese fishing vessels that has stirred up controversy further north along the Pacific coast of South America, Foreign Minister Andres Allamand said on Thursday.

Allamand said Chile´s Defense Ministry and Navy were monitoring the advance of the fleet in order to protect the “sovereignty” of the country´s exclusive economic zone.

The fleet consists of some 300 ships that frequent the Pacific Ocean, often around Peruvian waters, Allamand said.

The boats, previously fishing for giant squid near the Galapagos Islands off Ecuador, angered the domestic fishing industry in Peru last month and sparked a Twitter war between Washington and Beijing.

More:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-chile-fishing-china/ch

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Tensions rise in Ecuador and Peru as Chinese fishing fleet moves south from Galapagos

Tensions are rising along the Pacific coast of South America as a giant Chinese fishing fleet of roughly 300 vessels moves from the edge of the Galapagos marine preserve to the waters off Peru.

Tuesday afternoon, President Trump excoriated China on a variety of issues, ranging from the coronavirus to human rights, in a speech to the United Nations. He singled out Chinese fishing and maritime behavior, saying the country “dumps millions and millions of tons of plastic and trash into the oceans, overfishes other countries’ waters” and destroys coral reefs.

Soon after, the U.S. Embassy in Peru issued a tweet noting the Chinese mega-fleet off its shores, accusing the fleet of changing ship names and disabling GPS tracking to limit surveillance of the fleet’s activities.

“Overfishing can cause enormous ecological and economic damage,” the tweet said. “Peru cannot afford such a loss.”

More:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/tensions-rise-ecuador-peru-chinese-000101740.html

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Looks as if they started exploiting resources in the Pacific side of the Americas, then moved east to the Atlantic.

Thank you for the information.