FISHING OVER
THE LIMIT
Jessica Galvez
Figure 1. Overfishing causes many threats to the ocean environment and could possibly affect our future (Green Peace, 2016)
History of the Issue issue, but also us, as humans, we have
played a big part. Many are destroying
Overfishing has been a big threat to
habitats in the oceans to replace them with
the ocean environment causing a loss of
our own tropics to help our environment and
many of our fish. Over 27% of our fish are
not much of the fish environment. Much of
being lost or wasted and large seafood
our soil have been getting washed up in
industries play a big role in this issue.
rivers leading up to the
Many of these industries
contamination of the
need to help supply
ocean killing many
restaurants with
of our fish which is
seafood and fishing
caused by
them straight from the
deforestation. Oil spills,
ocean are the main
Figure 2. Fishing many at a time causing the low population of
our fish (World Wildlife Fund, 2016) pollution, poison,
way they can provide
human and animal wastes are all parts of the
their needs. Not only do industries cause this
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causes of this issue, but there are many ways possibly stop the food chain. On the other
to stop this from happening. hand, companies are trying to find ways to
Industries vs. Companies at least slow down this problem. Many think
There are two viewpoints that face that people dont pay much attention to the
this issue. Industries and the other being major issue of overfishing and focusing
many companies that are trying to prevent more on their own environment. Some ways
overfishing. Seafood industries have to
help supply restaurants so they dont run
out. Imagine how much they have to fish
every week or every month just to get the
amount they need to restock for places that
Figure 1. Many dead fish in the ocean caused by humans by overfishing
need seafood. This causes the fish (CNN, 2013)
population to slowly go down which could to stop this is by protecting the marine
wildlife, strengthening and expanding
protected areas, and revitalizing marine
fisheries in America. Not much has been
said about how they are going to get this to
work, but they will of course look into it
more.
My Thoughts on Overfishing
Overfishing can cause a large amount of our
fish population to go down. The oceans
Table 1. Statistics show how much money for fish
are being consumed by humans more than for environment are being highly affected due to
Industrial Purposes (The Seattle Times, 2013)
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the atmospheric levels.
According to The National
Oceanic Atmospheric The ocean has absorbed 30% of all the
Administration (NOAA, they carbon that we have put out into the
atmosphere since the Industrial
claim that, (Simmons,
Revolution...that means that the acidity level
2016). This quote clearly of the ocean is increasing.
states that the carbon and -Simmons
acidity that the oceans are
aware of what really goes, but focus more
absorbing is a big threat to the fish
on their own environment.
environment. This can cause corals to be
bleached which will slow down the food
Human and animal wastes such as dirt,
chain and destroy many of the living
smoke, vehicle exhaust, and air pollutants
habitats still in use by fish. People are not
also affect the ocean environment. Oil spills
also spread throughout rivers and oceans
killing many of the sea creatures that are in
the food chain. PCBs (polychlorinated
biphenyls) are a family of 209 related,
colorless, oily compounds, differing from
one another in the varying number and
position of chlorine atoms around their two
connected benzene rings, (Rivlin, 1998).
This describes of what the PCB oil spilling
Table 2. The carbon that we create in the air causes the
acidity to increase in the ocean bleaching out many habitats. contain of that could really affect our oceans
(Popular Science, 2011)
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with toxic bleaching coral reefs that are
a habitat to many animals living in the
sea. The PCB oil spill went from the
Hudson River leading up to the New
York Harbor also contaminating the
river and oceans connected to them.
There has also been some national
problems happening in many places.
...national problems, such as toxic
wastes, fouled beaches, drought, trash
disposal, and, recently, the Exxon oil
spill in Alaska, (Friedman, 1989).
These are some examples that relate to
the national problems happening and
Figure 4. (Pinterest)
many are being aware of these global
environmental issues.
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References
Friedman, S. M., & Friedman, K. A. (1989,
Jun). Environmental journalism.
Environment, , 6+.
Retrieved from http://sks.sirs.com
Rivlin, M. A. (1998, Muddy waters: GE,
PR, and PCBs. Amicus Journal, , 30-
37. Retrieved from
http://sks.sirs.com
Simmons, A. M. (2016, 12 Sep). Oceans
under siege and ways to mitigate the
threats. Los Angeles Times Retrieved
from http://sks.sirs.com
