China Empties the Seas

Via Lê Bá Dzũng

 

This is the fourth of a series on how China is chewing its way through the wildlife of its Asian neighbors. Here are the others: 

• China Wolfs Down Southeast Asia’s Wildlife
• China Eats the World
• China Dams the World

China takes more fish out of the world’s seas than the next five countries combined, in fleets underwritten by government agencies. In fact, China is collapsing the world’s fish stocks. The fish populations that once abounded along the country’s vast coastline have now all but vanished.  

Nor is this scouring taking place only along the Chinese coastline. Today thousands of Chinese ships are trawling international waters from Guinea to Liberia and Senegal to Taiwan, Palau and Fiji and beyond to Chile and even beyond that, Chinese fishing vessels are scouring the seas for anything that swims, vastly underreporting their catches to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

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