Educational Media Reviews Online

Technological advances have allowed us to catch so much fish that we have over-harvested many of our fish stocks. Between harvesting and accidental bycatch of 18-40 million tons per year, there are serious problems with our fisheries. Fisheries Beyond the Crisis describes the collapse of the cod fishery in the Bay of Fundy as well as the challenges faced by Indian subsistence fishermen now that factory fishing vessels have been granted access to their coastal waters.

Fisheries Beyond the Crisis clearly illustrates the nature of the fishery problem. For instance, in Canada, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has made use of "Individual Transferable Quotas to assign licenses to harvest limited fishery resources. Many individuals find it prohibitively expensive to fish, so sell their quota to larger companies and the result is that a very few people control a large portion of the fishery. The case in India is somewhat different. Local fishermen are trying to complete with large factory trawlers within their coastal waters.

Fisheries Beyond the Crisis shows the brighter side of the picture. Fishermen from the Bay of Fundy illustrate how their adaptability has helped to keep them in the fishing industry as long as they can remain flexible and practice community based management of the fishery resource. In India, the union based efforts of fishworkers have helped to educate people to the dangers of over-harvesting as well as the danger of exporting jobs, a situation that is all to common with the factory trawlers.

Portions of this film appear in the First Run/Icarus film entitled Fishing in the Sea of Greed. In Fisheries Beyond the Crisis the footage is more carefully edited and offers a much better presentation. The film is narrated by David Suzuki and is appropriate for a high school or adult audience and possibly some college libraries. Recommended.