Has money won out in this case or is EU bureaucracy to blame? Or large modern fishing companies? Or was the demise of the traditional wooden boat inevitable? Is this just useless nostalgia for an obsolete profession?
What, if anything, should be done to save the caïques?
I believe the demise of traditional boats is inevitable. I find this sad, but realistic. Like many other things, traditional fishermen boats will be considered as part of the history and probably won’t be used in the future, because of technology and the probable innovations when it comes to fishing and obtaining fish. The dark reality is that technology is replacing many things which were used in the past. For example, we no longer write letters to each other because we can send an email, many people haven’t touched a pen and paper, because they use their computer or tablet, books might be replaced by eBooks. This is the sad truth, and fishermen boats might be among these examples.
ReplyDeleteBut even though I think it is inevitable that fishermen boats will not be used in the future and won’t be conserved, I don’t agree with the views of the EU. With the new laws and subsidies they are providing, many ships will be lost much faster than I believe is necessary. I understand that the EU has its reasons for providing such subsidies , that they think that destroying fishermen boats will help keep the number of fish, but I think that small fishermen boats are not the real problem when it comes to increasing the numbers of fish. I believe that if the EU wants to help increase the numbers, they should focus more on the large companies and create stricter regulations for them. This would help increase the numbers of fish much more than destroying small fishermen boats which are considered tradition and part of the country’s culture.
By Rio
DeleteI totally agree with Barbora’s comment. In my opinion, this policy set by EU seems archaic, red herring and missing in practicality. Compared to large vessels, such as fishing trawlers, the effect of small fishing boats towards the decline of marine life is very limited, and I also think the destruction of those traditionally and historically valuable boats is not a priority matter. In addition, this policy would only increase the unemployed and collapse the fishing industry in Greece (94% of fishing vessels in Greece are small fishing boats). What EU and Greece should really do is to maintain and restore both the sea and the fishing industry. Under scientific researches, the EU should first understand what the real issues are, and from there, as Barbora mentions, they should construct a proper regulation (for equipment, vessel size, and the number of vessels per area) to maintain control of overfishing. However, setting a strict regulation may also lead to causing huge economic damage to the fishing industry. To avoid this, the EU should also simultaneously increase the unit price of fish, so the fishermen can make benefit with a small number of catches.