cyanide fishing in the Phillipines

[clarionreef]

Cyanide fisherman are a shunned minority among innocent fisherman in virtually every community in the nation.

There are a million fisherman in the Philippines. How many do you think use cyanide?
There is no constituency for cyanide fisherman.They are not a power bloc, voting block or low rung in a caste system.

They hurt fellow fisherman by ruining the grounds that all depend upon for livlihood. There is no policy of molly-coddling them. There are no senators and mayors advocating for them!
The case against the few thousand cyanide fisherman is the damage they do to other vast numbers of innocent Filipinos...and the systematic sabatoge of the coral based eco-system that supports them.
Much of the country is developing as the life of poor village fisherman...unravels.
Steve
why is it so hard for Westerners to understand this?

 

[Kalkbreath]

They would laugh as I suggested dynamite fishing to be the main cause of the destruction... Yes but the noise kept dynamiters futher afield. Cyanide was silent and you could even catch fish near the Coast guard boats .

In your blind quest to find hobby damage in PI , did you even notice that they said YES, blast fishing was they main cause of destruction?
The near shore reefs have been devoid of life from silt and agricultural run off since the 1970s. The trade didnt begin realy fishing until after 1982 the year you stated fish food fishermen couldnt suport themselves due to already depleted fish stocks.

 

[mkirda]

In your blind quest to find hobby damage in PI , did you even notice that they said YES, blast fishing was they main cause of destruction?

Arguing about whether blast fishing or cyanide fishing causes more damage is absolutely meaningless here. Evidence exists that cyanide is used by the Marine Ornamental Industry to collect Marine Ornamental Fish for export to the US.
Industry *is* guilty of breaking the laws in the Philippines. No amount of squirming you can do, Kalk, will do anything to change this fact.

Regards.
Mike Kirda

 

[Kalkbreath]

What is "the industry"? The USA pet fish industry is responsible?
Is the USA tourism industry responsible for the sex tours in Indonesia?
Is the USA movie industry responsible for pirate copies of DVDs in China?
How is the pet fish industry in the USA............ responsible for the entire Pet fish industry world wide?
You want the USA pet fish importers to be responsible for every thing we sell.?
That includes everything?
Should we be required to double check CITES corals? Just how would we do that?
Are we responsible to see that the filters and light fixtures we sell are not made in under age sweat shops in China?
{they are made in China} How Am I supposed to check the ages of the workers in the factory?
You Keep claiming that the industry is responsible , What does that mean?
We dont force our suppliers to brake the rules......We dont demand cyanide fish or Biowheels made by six year old girls.
What is it that makes me or "the industry" responsible ?

 

[mkirda]

What is "the industry"? The USA pet fish industry is responsible?
Is the USA tourism industry responsible for the sex tours in Indonesia?
Is the USA movie industry responsible for pirate copies of DVDs in China?
How is the pet fish industry in the USA............ responsible for the entire Pet fish industry world wide?
You want the USA pet fish importers to be responsible for every thing we sell.?
That includes everything?
Should we be required to double check CITES corals? Just how would we do that?
Are we responsible to see that the filters and light fixtures we sell are not made in under age sweat shops in China?
{they are made in China} How Am I supposed to check the ages of the workers in the factory?
You Keep claiming that the industry is responsible , What does that mean?
We dont force our suppliers to brake the rules......We dont demand cyanide fish or Biowheels made by six year old girls.
What is it that makes me or "the industry" responsible ?

Classic, Kalk. Squirm, squirm, squirm. It wasn't me. I'm not responsible for bringing in juiced fish, even though *IT IS ILLEGAL HERE AS WELL*.

 

[clarionreef]

Mike wrote;
Evidence exists that cyanide is used by the Marine Ornamental Industry to collect Marine Ornamental Fish for export to the US.
Industry *is* guilty of breaking the laws in the Philippines.

It seems to me that the Filipino side has initiated the breaking of the laws and the Western world has been the receiver...a lessor offense.

I own up to the role of irresponsibility inherent in what we collectively have done as a trade [ a nebulous charge that is indeed ] but it sure doesn't exonerate Filipino fisheries and their cohorts in the grant laundering community. They are all staffed with educated professionals and they get paid to blow this thing weekly.
For a decade now, there have been people on salary to address and deal with the trades dirty little secret and they will no doubt continue to milk the problem for another decade still.
Its easy to characterize commercial folk as money grubbing and greedy....as it is in fact the virtual definition of commerce.
But what do you call money grubbing and greedy folk whos specific job description is laced with keywords like sustainable, watchdog, resource guardian, community, implementation, enforcement, win-win, multi-stakeholder, capacity building and fair and equitable?
How can the robber be solely responsible if the bank president leaves the safe open every day and the guard never wakes up or carries a gun?
This daisy chain of complicity starts in Asia...and exports to the West in broad daylight with signatures and seals of approval from every agency involved in the legal process.

Steve

 

[clarionreef]

Test;
If you were to tell BFAR [Philippine fisheries] that you care more about his fishery resources then he... he would be offended and consider you an arrogant foreigner.

If you tell a Filipino NGO [ oft called reform or development group ]sitting in Manila and milking the issues of the village poor that you care more about his fishery resources then he... he would be offended and consider you an arrogant foreigner.

If you tell a US NGO [ oft called reform or industry watchdog] that they are culturally inept, field incompetent and fudging the numbers to perpetuate themselves with grant money and no actual field results then he will feel attacked for no reason and ask you to remain impotently polite...and join him.

If you tell the US Fish and Wildlife Service that they are totally missing their mission and have allowed illegally obtained cyanide fish into the country every single day for 40 years then they will be offended and consider you a pollyanna and a tree hugger type.

If you tell a fish dealer that hes bringing in cyanide fish with the approval of BFAR, US Fish and Wildlife , MAC ad infinitum....he may very well say;
How can I know more then them as they do this every day and are much closer to the field and the reality then I?
How can I alone be held responsible for the crime commited so far away?
At best I'm the receiver of a product that has passed thru many hands and passed muster at every step!

Its just a question....
Steve

 

[clarionreef]

and yet...
If you show a cyanide fisherman how he can make more money if he will use nets and handle the fish better....with a week of friendly demonstration....he has no problem with you at all.
There is no one on this issue easier to train and convince then the diver.
But the city based reform and regulation authority figures never ever had the fisherfolk as the centerpiece of their mission....and he was minimalized, marginalized and put aside as the more important aspects were funded and considered.
This reform gravy train has reached everywhere but where the divers are.

Steve

 

[Kalkbreath]

But again your blaming an industry for what one country has has done. Im about as responsble for what collectors do in PI as Tonga is responsible for what philipino divers did.
Guilt by association holds true on things like slavery and the German death camps? [then you have a lot of acres and mules to personaly dish out of your own pocket}
Ninty percent of my retail sales are not from fish.[I have more clams then fish}
Im I still responsible for the cyanide fishing you saw in 1982?
Are the people in Fiji? How about Shri lanka?
How about the coral farms in BAli , Tonga, ORA?
Your industry is quite different from mine.

 

[Jaime Baquero]

What is the percentage of marine ornamental fish coming to N.A from PI and Indonesia? Those are the two (2) countries where cyanide is being used constantly.

 

[Kalkbreath]

What is the percentage of marine ornamental fish coming to N.A from PI and Indonesia? Those are the two (2) countries where cyanide is being used constantly.

Only twenty three percent of the PI fish tested from 97 to 2001 had cyanide present.
Fish sales are no longer "The Industry"
What percentage of the industry sales are from cyanide fish?
What percentage of the sales at PAF is cyanide fish?
How about WSI?
How about at SDC?
How aboutAt FH
At Leader?
at INA?
The "INDUSTRY" today hardly revolves around 50 cent Philippine fish.
There is a "the pet fish industry"
and then there is the "Reef Tank Industry".
Just like Fresh water and marine, they do over lap but They are two very separate industries.
I didn't own any slaves and I dont sell cyanide fish from PI.......reparations from me or my "Industry"are hardly in order

 

[clarionreef]

Kalks right,
Its more and more a coral breaking trade then a coral poisoning one and yet the sheer numbers of fish taken has gone up thanks to the mass trade that Kalk has little experience with.
Pet Club, Petco and the other chains specialize in the common fish for beginners and as such keep the cyanide flowing as strong as ever.
The leading edge of the trade is reef oriented and yet the mass is not.
Steve

 

[Kalkbreath]

You call petco and petsmart the trade?
Your trade, not mine.
How many of the above mentioned LAX wholesalers sell to the big box stores? Solomon fish in Petco?
how bout Fiji fish? Tongan? Vanuatu?
I think I saw the Cultured corals in Pets mart .......no that was cat toys.

The real Industry reeform {reef tanks} has accomplished more in the past two years then ........ then the cyanide apologists did in the past twenty.
The emancipation of the reef tank industry from the pet fish club has officially begun.........

 

[clarionreef]

Kalk,
The cutting age trade is dwarfed by the junk trade...
And the junk trade kills everyones coral...so its relevant.
Steve

 

[Kalkbreath]

So what percent of the total trade is cyanide fish from PI?

 

[mkirda]

Only twenty three percent of the PI fish tested from 97 to 2001 had cyanide present.
Fish sales are no longer "The Industry"

Ninty percent of my retail sales are not from fish.[I have more clams then fish}

Your trade, not mine.

So what percent of the total trade is cyanide fish from PI?

Kalk,

This is again the same fallacy, the same argument, warmed over, yet again...
I killed only one person, Pol Pot killed millions. I'm not responsible for the murder of one.

If the results were showing that 23% of the fish tested were positive (am using your number here), then yes, it pretty much proves my point yet again, that the Marine Ornamental industry here in the US is guilty of importing illegally caught fish, which is, in and of itself, also *ILLEGAL*.

I mean, I knew you were going to squirm like a worm on a hook, Kalk, but this is surprising even for you. It is really quite clear cut and simple.

Regards.
Mike Kirda

 

[Kalkbreath]

No, ..........Those wholesalers bringing in Philippine fish are not " The Industry" .
Again I ask what percent of the industry deals in PI fish?
Total dollars in Philippino fish compared to all the other sources of live stock?
Ten percent? twenty percent? Not all dealers deal with Pi fish , many dont at all.
Testing conducted the last part of the 1990s found ten to twenty percent of PI fish were cyanide collected.............
What you call "the Industry" is actually an tiny fraction of the total Marine ornamental Industry...............twenty percent of Philippine fish porion of the total trade { ten percent} is not what I would call the
............"INDUSTRY"

 

[Kalkbreath]

I also dont understand how you can say that dealers are demanding cyanide fish ? They order fish , just like retailers order fish . Do you think retailers ask for poisoned fish rather then checking the box for the net caught option ? Are retailers equally to blame? Does ordering fish over the phone constitute their part of the vast conspiracy on the industry to support cyanide fishing? How bout hobbyists that buy cyanide fish ? Do the customers also own part of the responsibility for cyanide fishing in the remote parts of the Phlippine islands?

 

[clarionreef]

What if we just subbed cocaine for fish?
Whos culpable? Dealers or consumers?
The law says both of course...
What about the regular cocaine that causes murder, corruption and other crimes? Is there a murder free option to cocaine consumption?

Kalk kinda writes;
"I also dont understand how you can say that dealers are demanding murder causing cocaine ? They order cocaine , just like retailers order cocaine . Do you think retailers ask for murder causing cocaine rather then checking the box for the murder free option ? Are retailers equally to blame? Does ordering cocaine over the phone constitute their part of the vast conspiracy on the industry to support murder ? How bout hobbyists that buy cocaine ? Do the customers also own part of the responsibility for problems arising from buying cocaine in the remote parts of the world?"

Hes an oracle I tell you.
Dealers do want plausible deniability when they order fish though its true.
"I don't support cyanide fish...I only buy them....week after week....
also overheard at the most consciencious stores..."I heard they stopped that little problem out there ."
Steve

 

[mkirda]

What you call "the Industry" is actually an tiny fraction of the total Marine ornamental Industry.

Once again:

This is again the same fallacy, the same argument, warmed over, yet again...
I killed only one person, Pol Pot killed millions. I'm not responsible for the murder of one.

Guilty is guilty, regardless the number of people that you murder.

Your argument, Kalk, is complete fantasy, fallacy, smoke and mirrors...
Earlier, you admitted that industry was guilty, now it isn't. You can't have it both ways.