End of the Line, The (2009)

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End of the Line, The (2009)

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gentle instrumental music]

suspenseful orchestral music]

Danson: The Exuma Cays
Land and Sea Park in the Bahamas

is one of the oldest
marine-protected areas

in the world,

a man-made sanctuary
in the sea.

The waters teem with life,

from the smallest
to the largest creature

in the food chain

because they are protected

from the most efficient predator
our oceans have ever known.

suspenseful orchestral music]

- Now, where do you--

- Well, l reckon if you fish
off that point, cast it--

- Yeah, cast a fly
straight out.

Well, what's that?

- Probably a bass.

- Look, there!
Hey, hey, hey!

Look.

Rupert, there's fish here.

l came into this because,

in a very small
and very limited way,

l was a hunter of fish.

My first salmon...

my first salmon, also
the largest l ever caught...

Here we come.

On a Welsh river,
pounds.

l was chuffed to bits
to catch that.

Whew.
Huge fin.

l have never been
more proud of myself.

lt was the last that
anybody caught on that beach

for years and years.

l don't think anybody's
caught one as big as that since.

And l was triumphant,

but l also have felt guilty
about that fish ever since,

because it was
one of the last of a spring run

that now no longer happens.

Now, why were
fewer of them coming back?

Well, l didn't know,

but l thought
l'd better find out.

And that's
really what set me off

on this journey to find out
what was happening

to fish in the sea.

phone beeping]

- lt's Clover,
Charles Clover.

l've got some queries.

- Sir?

- What is the tuna
that you serve?

Which ocean is it from,
and how is it caught?

As a journalist,
what changed my view of the sea

was when l walked into
the wrong press conference

in the Hague
in .

And this was the first
presentation l'd ever seen

about the effect of trawling
upon the sea bed

and upon those creatures
that lived on it.

And what they said
was that trawling

with a beam trawler
was like plowing a field

seven times a year.

And l'm a farmer's son.

And l thought to myself,

''How many crops would grow

if you plowed that field
seven times a year?''

And l thought,
''Not very much at all.''

And that changed my whole view
of what was going on in the sea.

Danson: Our view of the sea
has always been

that it is huge, beautiful,
and inexhaustible.

The oceans
are the common heritage

of all mankind.

And for billions of years,

they have been
full of life.

- These huge resources, these--

that we once believed
to be renewable,

that our whole human history
has led us up to now to believe

that are renewable
are not renewable anymore

because of what
we're doing to them.

And so our entire philosophical
approach has to change.

lt's not gonna be
the same in the future

as it was in the past.

That's where we are now.

upbeat music]

upbeat music]

- singing] We are going back
on a different path.

We've finished all our duties.

- Row with all your might.

- lt'll be tonight.

Fish fingers,
and they're beauties.

- What a hearty bunch,
and what a crunch.

lt's truly fact,
not fable.

Cod filets so fine,
golden crisp every time.

- Come
to the captain's table.

Danson: We never used to think
about where our fish came from.

But in fact,
they're wild animals.

And we found that out
to our cost

for the first time
in Newfoundland.

For centuries,
the waters in northern Canada

teemed with unbelievable
amounts of codfish.

Legend had it that you
could walk across their backs

on the water.

The cod was so plentiful

that communities
thrived on fishing.

As the years went on,
technology improved.

The boats got bigger,
and catches increased.

The bounty seemed endless.

Then, in ,

the unthinkable happened.

all yelling at once]

- ln St. John's tonight,

angry fishermen
vented their rage.

They charged the room

where John Crosbie
was holding a news conference,

but security
would not let them in.

Danson: What had once been

the most abundant cod population
in the world

had been fished
out of existence.

- l've decided that,
effective at midnight tonight,

there will be a moratorium
on harvesting of northern cod

until the spring of .

- Either we cooperate
in addressing it,

or there's gonna be
no fish for anybody,

no fish for the Europeans,

no fish for the Canadians,

and an ecological catastrophe
on our hands.

- With or without you,

with or without you,

and not only me,

every fisherman
on this island,

we're going fishing.

Danson: Overnight,
, people lost theirjobs.

- The cod has gone, and l think
within the context of cod,

particularly
in the Canadian perspective,

is that this is a species

that has been fished
for centuries and centuries.

Cod was the reason that
people migrated from the U.K.,

from Europe,
northern France in particular,

to Canada.

lt was because of cod.

Danson: The fishing ban brought
the people to the streets.

They hoped that, one day,
the cod would return.

- The significance didn't drop,

didn't dawn on anybody
till much later.

- Today there are so few left

that they've got
endangered status in Canada,

and the cod populations
have not rebounded

despite a moratorium
on cod fishing since .

Danson: ln ,
this research vessel

set two lines,
each with , hooks,

to find out how many cod
were left in the waters

off eastern Canada.

On the first line,
they caught one small codfish;

on the second,
a small basketful.

The cod stocks had been depleted
to such a low level

that they were unable
to recover.

- For Newfoundland,
for a community for which

the whole reason
for its existence was cod,

there's this historical,
ingrained element.

lt's part of society,
permeates society.

And the loss of the fish

was basically akin
to sort of a loss of soul.

And it still remains that
years later.

Danson:
After the collapse of the cod,

a new breed
of fishery scientist

started to investigate
what had been happening

to all the fish
in every ocean of the world.

Local catches of fish had been
declining almost everywhere.

But what puzzled
the scientists in

was that the total world catch
kept going up and up.

lt didn't make sense.

- The concerns
that people had expressed

that local stocks
were going down everywhere

but that global statistics
were showing an increase,

that this was a discrepancy.

Danson: Daniel Pauly,

a leading expert
in global fishing, was asked

by the United Nations Food
and Agricultural Organization

to investigate
this mystery.

- Daniel Pauly
had the brilliance

to start examining why,

in the face of the evidence that
you saw in front of you locally

and in the face of evidence
like Newfoundland,

that the figures kept going up.

Danson: lt was when Pauly
and his colleagues

looked at the reported catches
from China

that they found their answer.

- For every part of the world,
the reporting was right,

except for Chinese waters.

- When Daniel Pauly
came to this department

and he said,
''l think they're wrong,''

l said, ''What do you mean
they're wrong?''

He said, ''Well, it can't be that
China's catching that much.''

- And they found that, actually,
when you looked at

the biological productivity
of the sea

and what we know about it
everywhere else,

the Chinese figures
could not be right.

They werejust made up.

They were made up
by Communist officials

who only got preferment
if the graphs went up.

Graphs kept going up because
they kept making up the figures.

And it was a huge
seismic moment.

- We concluded that they
were so biased upward, so much,

that if you corrected
for this effect,

the world catch
would not be increasing

but decreasing.

Danson: For the first time
in human history,

the future of the food
the world gets from the sea

was in doubt.

- lt sent a shiver
down my spine

because that was the one thing

that a lot of people
were holding on to.

''Well, things may be bad,

''but at least
we're catching lots,

''and they're catching more
every year,

so, you know,
it can't be that bad.''

- From about ,
we now realize,

it was on the way down.

And we only
figured that out in .

- All of these things
were like warning signals,

and they were telling a story
in aspects.

- This is a story that
was going on at the same time

as human influences elsewhere.

But it's been told late.

lt's been told--
we haven't had so much time

to do something about it.

And now it's on us.

And now, in the next maybe ,
years, it's crisis.

lt's crash.

lt's ''do something about it'' time.

And that's why this is arguably

one of the biggest problems
in the world.

Danson: Man has been hunting
fish in the sea

since he discovered
they were there.

For the last , years,

these men
and their forefathers

have expected
giant bluefin tuna

to migrate
from the Atlantic Ocean

to the Mediterranean Sea.

And every spring,
the fishermen set their trap,

an ancient method of fishing
known as the Almadraba.

men cheering]

The Almadraba fishermen

once used to catch
thousands of bluefin.

But over the last ten years,

their catches
have declined by %.

- speaking Spanish]

Danson:
On the other side of the world,

in Canada,
scientist Boris Worm

had been trying to work out
how many tuna

and other large fish
were left in the sea.

- Somebody said counting fish is
just as easy as counting trees,

just that they're invisible,
and they move.

So it's an almost
impossible thing to do,

especially
when you want to assess

how the global ocean
has changed,

the whole thing.

We asked
that very simple question:

where are we now
relative to a baseline

that we set around ,

because large-scale industrious
fishing started around ?

So here in ,
when this series starts,

we see that around Japan,

there's already
blue colors dominating,

meaning that the catch rates
were low,

around fish per hooks.

ln areas
that were newly exploited,

we see catch rates
about times higher,

or more fish
per hooks.

fishing line whirring]

Danson: Worm used
Japanese fishing fleet data

that had recorded
how many fish were caught

on every hooks they set.

- This is the first time

industrial long-line fisheries
went out into the open ocean

and just worked
through the whole ecosystem.

And you see that the fishery has
reached a truly global coverage.

And a lot of the ocean
is at the blue colors now,

meaning that abundance
of these large fish globally

has probably declined
by about %.

This has been
widely criticized,

and there have been many papers
written to undermine,

att*ck these findings.

- Totally wrong.

That's--there's just no question
that's totally wrong.

Danson: Some fishery scientists
felt that Worm's findings

didn't reflect
their local situation.

Some thought
that even attempting to count

how many large fish
were left in all the oceans

was an impossible task.

- l think that in their haste
to get the big picture,

they don't look carefully enough
at local places.

- They actually disagree
with one thing:

certain tuna,
yellowfin and skipjack,

in the Pacific,

and there, they say,
''lt's only %.

lt's not %.''

- Whether it's or or
or is rather irrelevant.

We all know
they've declined dramatically.

So focusing on the particulars
in that sense is not helpful.

Danson: The overall trends
in Worm's findings

were reflected
in official data.

Species after species
had collapsed.

- Everybody recognizes
that there's major problems

in the world's fisheries.

And at one level,

it's a question of how--
you know, of how bad is it?

Danson: Today in every ocean
of the world,

high-tech industrial vessels

are hunting down every known
edible species of fish.

- The basic problem in most
fisheries that are in trouble

is too many boats.

- Too much capacity
chasing too few fish.

Danson:
Global fishing capacity

could catch the world catch
four times over.

The world's
long-lining industry

sets . billion hooks
every year.

These are estimated
to be set on enough line

to encircle the globe
more than times.

The mouth of the largest
trawling net in the world

is big enough to accommodate
thirteen s.

- We are fighting a w*r
against fish, right?

And we are throwing at them
our industry.

And we are winning.

And that's how we perceive
our interaction with them.

lt's a fight.

- The thing is,
we're too good right now.

Technologically,
not a single hunted animal

on this earth
has a chance.

- These vessels are equipped

with so much
electronic equipment

that the fish have absolutely
no chance of escaping.

The skipper knows
exactly where he is

in relationship to a rock
where fish could hide,

in relationship to a wreck
where fish will be attracted to.

- lt doesn't take very long
for us to have

very serious consequences
in what we're doing.

We're not willing--
we keep pressing the button.

We're not willing
to hold back.

- The might
of the fishing armory

has grown exponentially
in the last years.

The amount of fishing power that
we have at our command today

far outweighs our ability
to control ourselves.

Fishing has transformed
entire ecosystems.

ln fact, l would say one of
the largest scale transformation

of the planetary environment

has been the impact
of bottom trawlers,

nets that are dragged
across the sea bed,

and as they are pulled,

they cut down the animals
that live on the surface,

things like corals
and sea fans and sponges.

The signs of destruction
brought up on deck by the trawl

would make an angel weep.

- lf the fishing effort
continued to increase,

continued to be directed
at the dwindling results,

you would, of course,
catch most of it.

Danson: The bluefin is one of
the most iconic fish in the sea.

lts beautiful
hydrodynamic shape

and specially heated blood

allow it to accelerate faster
than a super car.

Pound for pound,
its delicious flesh

is the most expensive
and sought after on the planet.

The bluefin once sustained
Roman legions in battle.

Now it feeds
fashion-conscious diners

in sushi restaurants
around the world.

- Bluefin is the front line.

Bluefin is the most immediate
crisis that we know about.

Danson: For many years,

scientists have been predicting
that the king of the tuna

would be hunted
to extinction,

but now
it is actually happening.

Roberto Mielgo
is a bluefin tuna fisherman

who has turned whistleblower

on an industry he believes
is out of control.

A lone presence
in the ports of Europe,

Mielgo is hunting
for information

to bring the slaughter
to a halt.

- lt's bluefin.

l can actually tell from here
it's bluefin.

l started in this business
as a tuna farm diver.

That was many years ago.

Those days
were the good old days,

when the stock was healthy,
l would say.

But then bluefin tuna
became big business,

l mean, really big business.

ln , l was in Tunisia,
l think it was.

And that's when l first sensed

that something terribly wrong
was happening.

The conflict was that l started
something l could not control.

And as from there,
l took the decision

to try and do the right thing.

camera clicks]

That is a bluefin unloading.

Let's say
there's only two containers,

and they jam-pack
those two reefer containers,

-feet reefer containers,

with tons each.

That is tons of fish,

which is more than what Taiwan

would normally declare
as catches

at the end
of the fishing season.

So there you go.
l mean...

- One boat?
- Just one boat.

What's at stake here is
an infamous minority of people

making millions
and millions and millions

by decimating a specie.

ls that right?
ls that moral?

Danson: ln Luxembourg,
European Union ministers

meet to decide
the fate of the fish

and the industry
which depends on it.

Fishing is supposed to be
controlled

through internationally
agreed quotas,

the amount fishermen
are allowed to catch.

These are recommended
by scientists.

- What will happen
this afternoon

and what it will mean
for the bluefin tuna?

- Well, what will happen is that
fisheries ministers of the EU

will take a decision
that goes against

any rational scientific advice
for the conservation of bluefin.

Danson: Bluefin scientists
are recommending a catch

of , tons
simply to avoid collapse.

ln order to rebuild
the fish population,

the catch needs to be less,
at , tons.

But ministers vote
for a catch of , tons,

twice what it should be

to keep the population
from crashing

and three times
what it should be

to let the fish recover.

- l just can't accept that.

This is a political quota.

lt's...

it's negotiating
with biology.

And you just can't do that

and expect to see
the biology survive.

- This is a species
which is as endangered

as the white rhinoceros,

and yet it's being hunted to
extinction in the Mediterranean.

lt's being exploited

at more than twice the levels
it should be,

and those countries
that have overfished it

are not being forced to pay back
what they've overfished,

so not a day in which
the European Union

has covered itself in glory.

Danson: Bluefin tuna
is not the only fish

whose stocks
have declined dramatically.

And most of the others
have declined

while under the supervision of
the scientists and politicians

in the richest nations
of the world.

- lf fishery managers
were engineers,

they would've been fired
long ago,

because, you know, we'd be
having collapsing buildings

and bridges all over the place

because the calculations
are so far out.

And so it's not a question of
if fish stocks will collapse

when you make decisions
like that.

lt's a question
simply of when.

Collapse is inevitable.

Collapse is inevitable.

cannon fires]

indistinct radio chatter]

- This is the center
of the bluefin tuna universe.

Malta is there.

Danson: Roberto Mielgo
has come to Malta

to investigate
whether the tuna industry

is catching more
than the quota allows.

- Hello, Charles.
How are you doing?

- How are you getting on?

- Well, busy.

- Have you found a lot?

- Quite a lot, yes.

Danson:
Despite the scientists

recommending an annual catch
of , tons

and the politicians
setting , tons,

official figures show

that the Mediterranean
bluefin tuna industry

simply ignores
the regulations

and catches , tons,

/ of the entire
bluefin tuna population.

Mielgo discovers that some
fishermen will stop at nothing

to get hold of this
sought-after commodity.

- l flew to Lampedusa
the other day.

And just by chance,

l came across
some interesting documents.

- ls there anything to link them
to fishing activity?

Danson: So they can catch
as many fish as possible,

the fleets use planes
to spot the tuna shoals,

an activity
that has been outlawed

during this part
of the season

for the last ten years.

indistinct radio chatter
in ltalian]

- Mostly,
these planes were operated

by ltalian fishing fleets
fishing south of Lampedusa,

east of Tunisia,

and outside Libyan waters.

This is a disgrace.

The ltalian government
isn't doing a thing.

Nobody is enforcing
the rule of law.

This is a disgrace
for the European Union.

Danson: The breaking
of the rules by fishermen

is one of the biggest problems
facing the world's oceans.

lllegal, unregulated,
and unreported fishing

is worth
up to $ billion a year.

- Fishermen cheat
because they can.

Fishermen cheat
because they don't get caught.

That's true of all systems.

Danson: A study
for the House of Lords

in the United Kingdom

reported that % of the cod
caught in the North Sea

was illegal.

- Every other fish
on your plate was stolen,

stolen from you.

bell tolling]

Danson:
Mielgo has come to Tokyo,

the center
of the world tuna trade,

where last-ditch attempts
are being made

to save the majestic bluefin.

- shouting in Japanese]

Danson: The biggest company
in the tuna business

is the multinational Mitsubishi,

makers of cars
and electrical products.

They don't actually
catch the fish.

They just buy it.

- l would think that
Mitsubishi Corporation itself

would be in control
of something like %

of all of the entire
bluefin tuna production,

northern bluefin tuna
production,

in the Atlantic
and the Mediterranean.

Danson: Mielgo is here
to attend a meeting

of the lnternational Committee

for the Conservation
of Atlantic Tuna,

lCCAT,

which has been called
in a desperate attempt

to persuade the industry

to stick to
internationally agreed quotas.

- Roberto speaking here
in Tokyo.

- How are you getting on?

- Well...

it's been
a humbling experience, Charles.

Danson: Mielgo had discovered
that Mitsubishi

were sending out
new, larger boats

to bring back bluefin.

- They have pumped up
their freezing

and transportation capacity.

Danson:
Mitsubishi claim to control

less than %
of the bluefin import market

and say the new boats were sent
to replace old vessels.

But Mielgo believes that
Mitsubishi and other traders

are building up frozen reserves,

which will be worth much more
if fish stocks are depleted.

- lf there's no more
bluefin tuna caught,

but you're sitting on , ,
, tons of it frozen,

you name the price.

Danson: Mitsubishi say
they try to provide

the Japanese market
with stable supplies

at reasonable prices,

while supporting policies

to ensure
long-term sustainability

of the stock.

But Mielgo fears
that the result

will still be the extinction
of the species.

- The immediate conclusion
one has to come up to

is that these guys
want to fish

until the very last
bluefin tuna.

Once they have caught
the very last bluefin tuna,

they will go on to bigeye tuna.

And once they have
overfished bigeye tuna,

they will go for
another tuna specie.

Danson: Mitsubishi insists
they want to preserve the tuna

for future generations

and they support cuts
in the bluefin quota.

The fate of bluefin

shows what
multinational corporations,

international
fisheries policy,

and consumer demand can do
to a wild species.

But the race to catch
the last fish,

whatever its price,

is happening
all over the world.

- speaking foreign language]

Danson: Hundreds of millions
of people in the world

depend on fish
to keep them alive.

For . billion people,

it is a key part
of their diet.

ln West Africa,

which used to have one of
the richest seas on the planet,

the stocks of fish
have declined massively

in the last years.

Rashid Sumaila is an expert
on West African fisheries

who has come to Senegal
to find out

what effect this has had
on local people.

- Fish is crucial
in West Africa.

l mean, the coastal people
depend on fish.

And even the interior people

come down when the funds
is upon them,

when there's drought,
deserts, and so on.

So it is very important
to keep this going

for the sake of the people,

because if the fish goes down,

the coast of West Africa
will be littered with problems.

We cannot afford
to let this go.

Danson: Adama Mbergaul
is an artisanal fisherman

who lives in Dakar,
the capital of Senegal.

Fishing is his livelihood.

- speaking foreign language]

Danson: Today Adama earns
$ from his fishing.

His fuel costs him $ .

What is left
has to feed his family.

- speaking foreign language]

Danson: Meanwhile,
on the same shoreline,

money is being made.

The governments
of many developing countries

trade fishing rights
for quick cash

from developed nations.

Taxpayers
from the Western world

pay for the largest
fishing boats on the planet,

super trawlers,
to fish the distant waters.

The locals in their pirogues
don't stand a chance.

- That's no good
for the fishermen.

- That's no good
for the fishermen.

That's no good for our sea.

That's good
just for European fishermen

and governments
of Senegal

because
it have a lot of money.

Danson: Haidar has dived
the waters off Senegal

for the last years
and has witnessed huge changes

to the health
of the local ocean.

He is campaigning
against foreign boats

fishing in his waters.

- When l see this,
l want to fight with this guy.

l want to fight with this--
and this here boat.

l want to fight
with the government

who take just money
and don't know what they do.

l want to fight with the world,

because the world's
going to be dead.

lt's not possible.

Danson: Fishing is
one of the most

wasteful practices
on Earth.

Every year,
more than million tons,

/ of the world's catch,

goes back over the side dead.

This includes hundreds
of thousands of turtles,

sea birds, sharks,
whales, and dolphins.

- See how he do
to destroy the ocean?

He takejust what he want.

He take just what he need
to sell now.

But the fish,
he don't need to sell that.

He put him out,

and he k*lled them.

Look all around you.

Danson: As the fish have been
taken by foreign fleets,

fishermen like Adama
have been left

with an impossible decision.

Should he leave his family

and risk the dangerous journey
to Europe?

- singing in foreign language]

- The fish goes,
the people are made poorer.

And what happens?
They try to emigrate.

The Europeans
like our fish,

but they don't like the people.

The fish has visa to come in,
but the people are turned back.

- singing in foreign language]

- l think that man
is not going to change

and the sea's
going to be dead,

because man is crazy.

We are crazy.

Our world is crazy world.

- giggles]

Danson:
ln the restaurants of Asia,

diners are buying live fish

in greater quantities
than ever before.

These are being taken
from the most beautiful parts

of the planet,
the Coral Triangle.

The Coral Triangle
is an area of ocean

half the size
of the United States

in the seas
of southern Asia.

Coral reefs were targeted
as a food supply

when local waters ran out.

The most desirable fish

are the reef's large,
colorful predators.

Our insatiable appetite
for such delicacies

threatens to tip the fragile
balance of nature into chaos.

- We don't know
what the implications are

of losing some of these very--

one particular component
of the ecosystem.

We just know that,
in other ecosystems,

there have been problems

and that when
we mess around with nature,

there's usually problems.

there's usually problems.

Danson: On the East Coast
of America,

there is a terrifying clue
of what can happen

when you disturb
the ocean's natural equilibrium.

- We've got
a big surprise for you.

We've got a Chesapeake ray.

- Yeah, baby.

- Say it one more time, boy!

- Hell, mama,
l'll bring it to you.

Look out at this.
lt's coming to you now.

Look out.
l'm bringing 'em to you now.

- Most people
don't use it as a food

'cause it's a little difficult
to get to.

Danson: ln Chesapeake Bay,

there have been
increasing reports

of a plague
of biblical proportions.

A little known inhabitant
of the bay, the cow-nosed ray,

has exploded in numbers.

Local scientist Pete Peterson
was investigating the increase

in the cow-nosed ray population

when he noticed that
the graph of their growth

was the exact opposite
of the graph of the decline

in their main predator,
the shark.

- Even a number
of quality scientists

will tell you that statistics
are, in some ways,

icing on the cake
when you do your science.

But to tell you the truth,

as you look at a plot
of how the numbers of sharks

along this coast have changed,

how the numbers of rays,
skates, and smaller sharks

have changed
at the same time,

you don't need
a statistic at all.

ltjumps
right off the page at you.

- When large predators
are taken out,

when they're depleted in
abundance as much as they are,

we have large ecosystem effects

that can cause
all sorts of domino effects

throughout the ecosystem,

a lot of them, surprising,
unforeseen effects.

Danson: There's evidence
of this knock-on effect

happening all over the world.

ln Newfoundland,
lobster numbers are exploding.

- The loss of cod and
other bottom-dwelling fishes,

what we have seen is
an increase

in the abundance
of other things.

So in this part of the Atlantic,

there's always been
a fair number of lobster,

but there's now evidently
quite a bit more.

So it seems fairly reasonable
to conclude

that the decline of cod
and other predatory fishes

has basically paved the way
for an increase in the abundance

of those things
that cod used to eat.

Danson: Fishermen have eagerly
fed off the bonanza.

There is big money
to be made in lobster,

but how long will it last?

- This is the situation
that happens

everywhere we have removed
the fish, the large fish.

ln many places,
what has exploded is the shrimp.

Shrimp have exploded.

There's good shrimp,
good money.

But if you fish them,
what then?

- The end point is
when the prawns

and the scallops, too,
have gone.

We really will be down
to a highly simplified ecosystem

of mud and worms.

Danson: Jellyfish infestations
are increasing.

Beaches are becoming
no-go zones.

Our oceans,
once full of large fish,

are now filling up with algae,
plankton, and worms.

- Plankton sticks pressed into
fish-shaped pieces, perhaps,

jellyfish burgers.

The options are endless.

- We're losing species.
What does that mean for us?

What does that mean
for society?

What does it mean
for the predictability

of the global oceans,

which is % of the planet?

And the answer is,

with every species
that disappears,

some of those services
are eroding.

There's less food.

There's declining water quality,

and there's declining stability
of the system.

What alarmed me the most was
that the ability of the system

to absorb shocks and disasters,
to deal with climate change,

to deal with overfishing
was diminishing.

lt could be
a road of no return.

Danson: According to data
collected by the United Nations,

the number of fish species
whose populations have crashed

is growing year by year.

Worm and the other scientists
have projected

that if the current trends
continue,

the stocks of fish
which we now eat

will have collapsed
by the middle of the century.

- What we noticed
was the curves,

they were separating,

the high-
and low-diversity curves,

but they were both dropping.

- All the fish
and invertebrates that we eat,

that supply us with seafood,

we found that by ,

about / of them were in
what we call a collapsed state.

Over the last years,

there was
a very, very clear trend

of year after year after year,

more of these species were
in that collapsed category.

- They started very high.

They kept dropping and dropping
and dropping and dropping.

And if you take those curves
and you say,

''Well, they're dropping.

'When are they gonna hit zero?

'When are they gonna drop
down to the point

'where the fisheries
that we're used to

are no longer
gonna be possible?''

And those curves drop down,

and they hit zero
about .

- This is not
some horror scenario.

lt's a real possibility.

And it's not rocket science,

because if we're depleting
one species after another,

it's a finite resource.

There will be a point
in the future

where we will run out

if we don't change the way
we treat this global resource.

Danson: Worm and the others
were criticized

by their opponents
for naming a precise date.

But this was not
the point they were making.

- Whoever makes
an extrapolation

makes it always assuming
that things remain the same.

And l would say that, assuming
that things remain the same,

this prediction
that we will have no fish

in years or so,

are essentially correct.

- When the human population

comes under
real pressure on land,

when we begin to have real
problems from global warming,

when we start
running out of enough food

to feed ourselves,

we have just squandered
one of the greatest resources

that we've ever had
on the planet,

wild fish.

That's what it means.

somber violin music]

somber violin music]

Danson: For generations,

men have hunted
the world's oceans.

For generations,
we have eaten fish.

What can our generation do

to stop us reaching
the end of the line?

- Fish,
l love fish,

eating fish
than meat.

l can eat fish
four times a day.

My son doesn't like fish.

lf l cook fish, he's like,
''No, Mommy, l want chicken.''

And l said,
''Fish is good for the body.''

But he says, ''No.''

Well, l love fish
and-- %.

- Well, l love to eat fish.

laughs]

So fish are...

Fish are food to me.

- Lots of the time,
people say,

''Where are all the fish?
% of the fish gone.

Where are they?''

Well, we have eaten them.

That's what we have.

We have eaten them.

- When we look at a piece
of fish on our plate,

what do we know
about that fish?

We know it's good for us.

We know it's probably got
some omega- fatty acids,

which are good
for all our organ functions.

But what else
do we know about it?

What do we know about it?

Do we know
what species it is even?

Do we know
whether it was caught legally

or illegally

or in the waters
of some distant country

where the inhabitants
would actually prefer

to have caught it themselves?

Hello, lngrid.

lt's Charles Clover
from the Daily Telegraph.

l noticed that marlin
was on the menu.

This is kind of an unusual fish
to find on the menu.

And l wondered which species
of marlin this was,

'cause l thought there wasn't
an awful lot of marlin left.

Both these fish,
the bluefin tuna

and the Chilean sea bass

are listed
as endangered species.

l wanted to talk
to someone who would know

l wanted to talk
to someone who would know

about the sourcing policy
for fish at Nobu restaurants.

Can we send them an email?

No, we can't.

Danson: British journalist
Charles Clover

has been trying to find out
what has sold

in some of the most exclusive
restaurants of the world.

After five years
of no comment,

eventually,
Nobu agreed to talk.

- Hello?

- Hello, Mr. Clover.
How are you?

- Hello, Mr. Notar.
How are you?

- l feel like l know you.

- laughs]

You've got a fish that
has actively been described

as endangered since .

And you're serving it
in your restaurants.

- Not only are we
going to describe

what it is on the menu.

l'm gonna
put an asterisk next to it,

and on the bottom of the menu,

l'm going to say,
you know,

''lt is an endangered--

an environmentally
endangered species,''

just so people know.

That's the first immediate step
that we can do.

Then we also--

- lt's a sort of hard sell.

You know, ''Here's
some endangered species.''

Are people gonna buy that,
do you think?

- Well, l mean, you know,
you're boxing me into a corner.

At one point, people say,
''You're not being informative.''

At some point, people have
to make decisions on their own.

lf you look
at a pack of cigarettes,

it has warning signs that say,
''This will k*ll you.''

- The question
people will want to know is

why you just don't take it
off the menu now.

lf you've got orangutans
and, you know, cheetahs

and lions and tigers and things
on that menu,

l mean, people
would, you know, be...

be walking away.

There'd be huge scandals.

There'd be
tabloid stories about it.

People would be execrated.

People--there would be
turds on people's doorsteps

and in envelopes
being shoved through them.

People would, you know,
burn each other's houses down,

scratching their cars.

And yet we're doing it
to things in the sea.

And we're doing the same thing.

- This dish is modern,
cool, refreshing,

looks really, really,
like, flashy.

But it's dead, dead simple.

So l've got some
beautiful bluefin tuna.

Danson: Now that these kind
of popular television programs

with celebrity chefs
have made fish fashionable,

is it too late
to save the world's oceans?

- People ask me all the time,

''Are you despairing,
or are you hopeful?''

And l say,
''l'm absolutely hopeful.''

And they ask,
''What makes you think that?''

And l say,
''Well, two things.

''One is, now we have
a much better understanding

''than even five years ago
of what's going on.

''And there's a track record
of when we understood changes

''and they became
public knowledge.

''They entered
people's consciousness,

''like with pollution,
like with ozone depletion,

''with climate change,
more recently.

Things started to happen,
and people made changes.''

- l think that
there's a message of hope

because there's
still time for us

to turn the course of history.

And although
the players have taken poison,

there's still time
to save them.

helicopter blades whirring]

Danson:
Alaska is on the front line

in the battle
to conserve fish.

- According to the U.N.,

according to the only laws
that we have of the sea,

the sea belongs to us,
the citizen,

not to the fishermen,

not to the aggregates industry,

not to the oil
and gas industries.

lt's ours.

So why don't we claim it back?

indistinct radio chatter]

Danson: Alaska has
a -mile fishing limit,

which it strictly enforces.

- Portlock Bank,

coordinates are gonna be ...

lt appears that they've been
fishing in one area,

and they're claiming another.

- One of the lessons
from Alaska is,

first you have to not allow
new boats to enter,

and you have to find mechanisms
to get some boats to leave

to match your fleet size
to the capacity of the resource.

Danson: Alaska's fishing policy
is not perfect,

but the number of fishing boats
here is carefully controlled,

and managers can monitor
how much is being caught

and react accordingly.

Fishing policy here
is determined by the science.

Catch limits are set
well below the level

that fish populations
can withstand.

- One of the differences
between Alaska and, let's say,

the North Sea or--

is that the average
exploitation rate

on stocks in Alaska
is on the order of % a year.

ln the North Sea,
it's %.

Danson: One way in which
Alaska controls the catch

is by giving the fishermen
a limited amount of time

to fulfill their quota.

flare whooshes]

- Flare, flare, flare!

frenetic orchestral music]

- lf you look at it from just
a personal perspective,

sometimes there's
a personal sacrifice.

But if you look at it
from the big picture,

you got to take a cut
in the harvest.

But you take that knowing that
it gives you an opportunity

to maybe have a better season

two, three, four,
five years from now.

We just don't want to catch that
fish this year or next year.

We want to catch it
, , years from now.

Danson: As consumers,

we have the power to bring about
a positive change at sea

by demanding to know
where our fish comes from,

how it was caught,

and whether it is endangered.

- There is
a fishing industry out there,

some of which
is trying incredibly hard

to get it right.

And they are not being supported
as much as they should be,

because people are not
recognizing the difference

between what they're doing

or the guys who are just

rampantly raping the seas
are doing.

l think we have to support that
part of the fishing industry.

Danson: For consumers,

there are guides to identifying
which fish is better to eat.

Then there are labels which
certify its sustainability.

One is issued by
the Marine Stewardship Council,

the MSC.

- What we do and the choices
we make in, say, supermarkets,

when we go to a restaurant,

actually has a direct effect
on marine diversity.

Danson: At the moment,

only a small proportion
of the fish we buy

comes from a sustainable source.

But with pressure,
things are slowly changing.

Even the world's largest
retailer, Walmart,

has plans to sell only MSC fresh
and frozen fish by .

- We sell approximately
million pounds

of fresh fish a year.

We had to do something
that would protect us

as we grow and as we need
more and more product

into the future.

And that's where the MSC
really shone out to us

as a leading way
that we can really embrace

and grow our business.

Danson: Birds Eye, once
the king of the Codfish Finger,

now buys over / of their fish
from sustainable sources.

And fast food outlet McDonald's
say that over % of their fish

comes from a sustainable source.

- Knowledge is power.

And what knowledge gives you
is the opportunity

to change the way
that you do things,

to change the way
you behave.

Danson: More and more fish
are now being farmed.

Danson: More and more fish
are now being farmed.

Many people
see this as an answer

to the increasingly desperate
problem facing our oceans.

But fish farming
is not all that it seems.

Fish farming uses wild fish
to feed farmed fish,

but it kills
more than it produces.

All of these anchovies
will be ground up for fish meal

to feed fish and other animals
around the world.

- Of the million tons

that get fished every year
on the planet,

% go and get ground
into fish meal

to feed other fish
and not to feed people

so that some rich people
somewhere in the world

can eat salmon
and can eat shrimp.

- The more fish farming
we do in the West,

the less fish we have.

This is one of the paradoxes

that people have big--
have problems understanding.

- Aquaculture for species
that eat fish

doesn't have
that much room to grow

because there just aren't
that many fish out there

in the ocean
to feed them anymore.

- You actually convert fish

from one species
into the other.

You don't make more fish,

at least not when
you have farmed fish.

Danson: On average,
five kilos of anchovy

make only one kilo of salmon.

- We've reached the buffers.

We have reached the limits

of what the ocean
is capable of providing

to feed
the fish farming industry.

So how can it grow

if it's already reached the end
of its feedstock?

Danson: Patricia
has started a campaign

to encourage people
all over the world

to eat small fish like anchovy,
herring, and mackerel,

instead of the farmed fish
that are fed on them.

- Why not eat the fish directly?
Why not eat the anchovies?

They're much better for you
than salmon anyways.

lt's this tiny little fish
that has all the energy

that you need to be healthy.

Danson: lf fish farming
is not the answer,

despite attempts
to make it less wasteful,

and sustainable fisheries
aren't catching on fast enough,

what else can we do
to save the world's oceans?

- We need to turn back
the clock years

to bring back life,

to restore
its previous abundance

and productivity

in some places
around the world oceans.

l'm talking about
creating a network of areas

within which
we can turn back the clock.

- lt's a nice country.

lt can't be more beautiful
than this

outside of dying
and going to heaven.

Danson: Marine reserves
are areas of the world's oceans

where commercial fishing
is completely banned.

The results can be staggering.

- Wherever people
have established an area

that's off-limits to fishing
and policed it well,

they've been resolute
in their pursuit of protection,

reserves have shown
marvelous benefits.

l've studied marine reserves
in the Caribbean.

And there, the local community
set up four areas

that were off-limits
to fishing in .

Over time, you could see the
reef repopulating and refilling,

and life was becoming
more abundant on them.

And we saw an increase
of three, four, five times

the amount of fish
that were present initially

over a period of seven years
of protection after that.

Danson: Hardy McKinney
is a fisherman

in South Andros
in the Bahamas,

campaigning for a reserve
to be set up

in an area
decimated by fishing.

- Have this area set aside
as a protected area.

No one is permitted
to go here to fish.

And you allow the fish
to do what they do.

lt'sjust a natural thing.

You would have more fish.

So you would go to a rock

where there's
one Nassau grouper.

And next year,
you may see two.

And then the following year,
you may see four.

And so, you know,
naturally, it would work.

- Marine reserves
are absolutely necessary.

But they are necessary,

and we must have lots of them.

- The best available calculation
on how much it will cost

to have a global network
of marine-protected areas

that would cover
between % and %

of the area
of the world oceans

is that it would take about

$ billion to $ billion
a year

to manage
a network of that scale.

Compared to fishery subsidies,

the amount
is roughly equivalent.

The fishery subsidies
are estimated to be of the order

of about $ billion
to $ billion a year,

and those subsidies
encourage overfishing.

What this $ billion
to $ billion cost

of managing
protected areas would do

would be to contribute
to the solution to overfishing

and, in the process,

would create about
a million jobs worldwide.

Danson: The world has signed up
to establishing a network

of marine-protected areas
by .

Some nations have promised
to protect % or more

of their seas
in the future.

But we have to put pressure
on governments

to ensure this happens.

- We have
about , marine reserves

of different sizes
in the world.

They cover less than %
of the world ocean, . %, . %.

. % of the ocean
is fishable.

- You're allowed to fish
in % of the ocean.

Now, that doesn't seem to me
to be a proper representation

of our interests
as citizens.

Danson:
Marine reserves on their own

will not solve the problem
of the emptying seas.

Fishermen and migratory fish
will move to unprotected areas,

so these also
have to be controlled.

Politicians
have to act responsibly

when making decisions
about the oceans.

Consumers need to change
their eating habits.

And the global fishing industry
has to abide by the rules

and reduce its capacity.

- The problem is getting
political will

to implement these things.

And people will always argue,

'Well, you can't do this

because it would affect
too many people's livelihoods.''

Well, in the end,
those livelihoods

are disappearing
year by year

with inaction.

- l want them to manage
the sea for recovery.

l want it
to be full of fish.

l want it to be full
of cod and skate and...

haddock and halibut
and, you know, shellfish

and everything.

- Does society want to see
that recovery take place?

Or is society happy
with massive depletions?

l don't think
my six-year-old daughter

is going to be
particularly happy

in ten years' time
when she reads about this stuff

and learns about it and says,

''God, all this happened
in your lifetimes,

in your lifetime,
my lifetime.''

Anyone who's ,
, , years old,

this has happened
on our watch,

and we have
a collective responsibility.

- The difference between this
and other environmental problems

is that, actually, it is
relatively simple to solve.

We can act now.

lt's not rocket science.

We don't need
more knowledge to do so.

So let's do what we can
where we can.

You can do it here.

You can do it now.

- You just do it.

- singing] Now, there are
three steps to heaven.

Just whistle,
and you will plainly see.

And as life travels on,

and things do go wrong,

just follow
steps one, two, and three.

Step one:

you find a girl you love.

Step two:

she falls in love with you.

Step three:

you kiss and hold her tightly.

Yeah, that sure
seems like heaven to me.
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