"U.N. Urges Foreign Fishing Fleets To Halt 'Ocean Grabbing'"

"'Ocean grabbing' or aggressive industrial fishing by foreign fleets is a threat to food security in developing nations where governments should do more to promote local, small-scale fisheries, a study by a U.N. expert said on Tuesday."



"The report said emerging nations should tighten rules for access to their waters by an industrial fleet that is rapidly growing and includes vessels from China, Russia, the European Union, the United States and Japan.

'Ocean-grabbing is taking place,' Olivier de Schutter, the U.N. special rapporteur on the right to food and the report's author, told Reuters. 'It's like land-grabbing, just less discussed and less visible.'

The 47-page report on 'Fisheries and the Right to Food', which said 15 percent of all animal protein consumed worldwide is from fish, will be presented to the U.N. General Assembly."

Alister Doyle reports for Reuters October 31, 2012.
 

Source: Reuters, 11/01/2012