'Gillnets’ are weighted and hang down in the water, where the fish are unable to see them, and those too big to get through the mesh are caught by the gills and fins and either suffocate or bleed to death from thrashing about in an attempt to free themselves. Some fish are caught individually, either harpooned or hooked by 'long-lining' which is the use of a long stretch of line (as long as 30 miles) with hundreds of thousands of hooks. These methods are used to catch large fish such as swordfish, tuna and shark.

Government intervention is being used as a method to bolster the fish industry as supplies plunge towards rock bottom. In 1994, $124 billion was spent in catching $70 billion worth of fish. The $54 billion shortfall was taken care of at the taxpayers’ expense. However, as with the European Common Agricultural Policy fiasco (the buying up of produce farmers had been unable to sell, resulting in ‘beef mountains,’ ‘wine lakes’ etc. etc.), this only acts as an incentive for more and more would-be fishing tycoons to jump on the gravy train, draining government funds and further destroying the oceans.

Vegetarians eating fish has never made sense to me, even though I did it for a while when I was vegetarian (mostly cos my poor mother, in her despair, saw it as the only possible source of protein left in my crazy crazy diet). It’s probably mainly to do with the myth that fish don’t have feelings, and they’re not farmed (I'll get to that later) or treated inhumanely: how could you mistreat a fish? Well, let’s see: when fish are taken out of the water, they suffer tremendous decompression (like the bends for divers): they are out of their natural habitat where the pressure and surroundings are different. They are not designed to be exposed directly to air; this is why the gills of caught fish bleed. The massive internal pressure often ruptures the swimbladder, causes the eyes to pop out of the head, and forces the windpipe and stomach out through the fish’s mouth.
As well as commercial catches, turtles, young fish, seabirds and marine mammals are caught up and mangled in the vast nets. The catch is sorted and the dead or dying 'debris' cast overboard. The worst case of this is in shrimp fishing, where over 20lbs of ‘useless’ creatures are dragged from the ocean for every pound of shrimp. Since the bad publicity to do with tuna fishing, techniques have become more dolphin-friendly, but thousands of sharks, turtles and large fish are still trapped and destroyed in the nets. Commercially viable fish are dumped in piles on the boat where they will be suffocated and crushed by the masses of other fish thrown on top of them. Spiked sticks called pickers are used to sort the fish – the spike is driven through the flesh and the fish tossed into separate piles. Then the fishes’ throats and bellies are slit.

Fish farming does not solve these problems, as ocean fish are often used to feed their captive fellow creatures. Apart from depletion of the oceans, farmed fish are unhealthily and unnaturally bred, and like all intensive animal-rearing operations, huge amounts of antibiotics go into the production process. Aqua (fish) farmers naturally have a healthy interest in profit, and so keep huge numbers of fish in inadequately sized breeding areas. This causes disease, injury and stress to the fish. To combat the infections and parasites in the fish, aquafarmers throw mountains of antibiotics and chemicals at the problem. Fish are confined in tanks in steel buildings, with automated food, light, and growth stimulation (maybe even the odd Brave-New-World-style tape that plays while they sleep and convinces them subconsciously that they’re lucky to be farmed fish). Like other factory-farmed animals, they’re pumped full of drugs and hormones and also genetically engineered to promote unnatural rates of growth and make them easier to efficiently process.

Again in the manner of all intensive farming, aquaculture must destroy the environment to turn a satisfactory profit. It takes 8 tonnes of water to raise 1 tonne of fish (shrimp production takes 10 times this). Huge amounts of waste are produced relative to what large human populations would create: fish faeces, pesticides, and an interesting selection of chemicals are piped straight into coastal waters, wrecking ecosystems and generally fucking things up. Fish farms also bollox up natural bodies of water by taking advantage of them as ready-to-use factories and overloading them with unhealthy, drugged-up, and frankly quite disturbed fish which of course must be accompanied by their medication whether their hosts, the water’s natural inhabitants, like it or not. Layers of fish crap form on the surface of the water, sapping oxygen from it and killing the (previously) living organisms below.

Although aquafarmers might say, “Well, if the depletion of the oceans is such a problem, we’re doing the world a favour by farming fish,” carnivorous (fishivorous?) species like salmon and shrimp are fed on other fish, taken from the oceans: it takes 5lbs of sea fish to produce 1lb of farmed fish.

As supplies dwindle further and further, ships stray into other countries’ fishing territories, sparking disputes and bad feeling between nations (e.g. 'those thieving bloody spaniards!!!'). Industrial vessels on the hunt for a worthwhile catch poach stocks from subsistence fishers, devastating small communities and already weak economies (in Galicia, on the northern coast of Spain, 90% of the fish catch is eaten fresh by the people. This natural, healthy way of life has earned the region the label of possibly Europe's most 'backward' region).

But don’t let it be said that the fishing industry is about all take and no give. In return for its lifeblood, trawlers give back to the ocean:
• 450,000 plastic containers,
• 52 million pounds of plastic packing material, and
• 298 million pounds of plastic fishing net

Although fish is touted as a healthy and invaluable source of protein in the supposedly health-conscious western world, the average diet contains about twice as much protein as is recommended: excess protein intake is linked to obesity, osteoporosis and kidney disease. A plant-based diet provides more than enough protein, and has the added benefits of phytochemicals (of which fish has none), antioxidants and fibre found only in plant foods. On average, raw fruit contains 3-9% protein. Often mentioned in conjunction with veganism is the idea that the omega-3 fatty acid is found only in fish. This is incorrect: walnuts, soya beans, linseeds, canola, wheat germ and green vegetables all contain this. The one thing plant foods don’t have is cholesterol - one of the major culprits in heart disease. It is thought that the Recommended Daily Allowance of cholesterol should probably be none at all. The body does need some cholesterol, and produces this itself. If you want to do your part for the world’s oceans, adopting a vegan diet as well as cutting out seafood can further help the situation as 1/3 of the world’s fish catch is used as fodder for livestock.

Fish are also highly at risk of absorbing much of the pollution that humanity pumps into the world’s oceans and rivers. A group of carcinogenic substances called PCBs - the use of which was abolished in 1976 – get more and more toxic as time wears on, and are consumed by fish, which are then consumed by humans. The PCBs gather in body tissue and stay there. Mercury (which damages the brain and nervous system), lead and pesticide levels are also high in fish stocks, not just accumulating in the fishes’ system but actually becoming more concentrated with time. Fish and shellfish can also harbour a number of naturally occurring toxins, none of which can be detected by sight or smell, nor destroyed by cooking. An investigation into a number of fish markets in the U.S. revealed that nearly half the fish tested were tainted with traces of human and animal faeces. Only 1% of the domestic catch and 3% of the imported catch are tested for contamination. Knowing this, it can hardly come as a surprise that seafood has such a reputation as a cause of food-poisoning.

Agriculture is a huge source of pollution in today’s world: fertilisers and manures containing nitrogen and phosphorous are washed into rivers and lakes, and from there make their way into the seas and oceans. Land used for fodder crops and animal farming sites are primarily to blame. Farm animals create enormous amounts of waste that is extremely detrimental to the environment. Nutrients from fertilisers and animal and human waste kills millions of fish, and also provide algae with the nutrition to grow way out of natural proportion; the algae subsequently leaches all the oxygen from the water, leaving it uninhabitable for fish. The pesticides and toxins in farm runoff also have a devastating effect on fish life. Freshwater fish suffer most from this pollution as they are closest to the source and also quite sensitive to pollution. But large amounts of marine fish also spend some period of their lives in freshwater. This runoff from rivers also has a huge impact on the seas. A constantly expanding area of 7,000 square miles of ‘dead’ ocean exists at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. This literally lifeless area is caused by agricultural pollution and the resulting overdevelopment of algae. As the water is drained of oxygen, any sealife trapped in the area are unable to survive.

So how about you think about what's on your plate next time you find yourself tut-tutting over the state of the environment.

Figures from www.earthsave.com and www.peta.org