My God... let me tell you that this is not an easy job... it really is not, but it must be done with courage, persistence and with good heart.
I persist with the local fishermen and captains in order to instruct them why they should adopt the tori lines and the other mitigation measures. It is hard to convince them that if they reduce capturing seabirds, they will catch more fish and so generate more income for all of them and their families.
But as I said, it's hard and that's why my work on the ATF Brazil has been very busy on the harbour, giving talks, explaining the problem and addressing the by-catch of seabirds to fishermen and fishing industry owners.
The fact is that they all know what is happening on high sea... They all know that lots of albatrosses and other seabirds die on a daily basis on hooks ... But they don't care really...
Many captains say that they will only put the tori line when an official law from the Brazilian government will oblige them to mount the tori lines. Here, in southern Brazil, in Itajaí, where the biggest industrial fishing centre is located, there are reports about longline boats capturing about 40 to 50 albatrosses on a SINGLE fishing set!!!!!!
It's appalling!!! These numbers are brutal... and that's why we at Projeto Albatroz are working so much and so worried about this cause!
I believe that if all captains would follow Captain Zé, from Macedo I vessel, this problem could be resolved. Before he adopted the tori line, his vessel was capturing an average of 70 seabirds per fishing set.
After talks with Tatiana Neves, Projeto Albatroz general coordinator, about the tori line, he created his own tori and since 2001 he started using all the mitigation measures.
He is proud that in 2006 he just captured accidentally only five albatrosses! What an achievement!! In 2007, he wants to catch zero. We hope he can achieve that task!
I have been creating lots of activities to make fishermen, captains, fishing business owners and the public really aware of what is happening.
For that, I have organised lots of workshops for fishermen, produced and showed diverse videos recorded from the fishermen that already use the mitigation measures to the ones that don't use the measures, organised a stand dedicated to the problem in a very important nautical exhibition, where business fishing owners come together and, presently just managed to get some time in the most-viewed and listened TV and radio stations to produce two programmes to be broadcasted to the local fishing community,
Ah!! and I have managed to get three captains to adopt the tori line in their boats! I will mount these toris very soon!