By Euan Dunn, Head of Marine Policy
Want to help restore the life to our seas? Then show MEPs your support today by contributing to a virtual fish stock.
Overfishing is damaging the marine environment and threatens the coastal communities that depend on fishing. Europe’s fish stocks are in a worse shape than many others in the world, with on average two-thirds considered overfished. Europe has lost around a third of its fishing jobs in the last decade, yet the EU fleet’s fishing power has continued to increase. As stocks declined, we have become ever more dependent on imports, foreign fishing grounds and aquaculture to fill the fish gap. A disastrous EU Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) is at the root of this decline and fall.
But it is not too late: Every once in a decade, the CFP comes up for reform, and we are at a revision point now. So the current revision is a rare opportunity to fix it for once and for all. In the ongoing reform, MEPs in the European Parliament have unprecedented influence. In December, the Parliament’s Fisheries Committee took a momentous step towards turning the tide on overfishing by agreeing an ambitious set of reform proposals that would radically transform the CFP.
A key European Parliament vote to accept its Fisheries Committee’s recommendations for CFP reform is due on 6 February. The RSPB and other NGOs (Non Governmental Organisations) have been working together to urge MEPs to push for the bold reforms so desperately needed. How they vote is vitally important and will have a huge bearing on whether we set EU fish stocks on the road to recovery or condemn them to carry on bumping along the bottom.
That is why the RSPB is supporting an innovative way to allow people from across Europe to call on MEPs and other EU leaders to take the bold measures needed to restore fish stocks. Through the Paint a Fish campaign, initiated by the new economics foundation (nef), anyone can add their support by painting a fish at www.paintafish.org You can paint a fish online, or upload a picture - so you can get creative with pens, pencils, paint, make a collage, or draw a picture in the mud or snow (whatever you have available).
The Paint a Fish campaign aims to educate and engage younger generations in the protection of fish stocks. Besides building a virtual fish stock with contributions from all over Europe, the campaign has also developed a set of educational resources to help teachers and schools in the UK to plan lessons on sustainable fisheries.
Ahead of the important vote by MEPs, RSPB’s joint e-action with nef and other NGOs allows everyone to send their fish drawings and paintings to their MEPs. The more fish pictures we collect, the bigger the ‘stock’ and the louder our voice will be. Every fish counts!
Paint a fish now at www.paintafish.org
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Fish stocks belong to all of us. We must ensure a sustainable future for fish, fisheries, seabirds and the other wildlife which depend on a healthy marine environment for generations to come.