Fishing industry
The fishing industry includes any industry or activity
concerned with taking, culturing, processing, preserving, storing,
transporting, marketing or selling fish or fish products. It is defined by the
Food and Agriculture Organization as including recreational, subsistence and
commercial fishing, and the harvesting, processing, and marketing sectors. The
commercial activity is aimed at the delivery of fish and other seafood products
for human consumption or as input factors in other industrial processes.
Directly or indirectly, the livelihood of over 500 million people in developing
countries depends on fisheries and aquaculture.
There are three principal industry sectors
· The commercial
sector: comprises enterprises and individuals associated with wild-catch or
aquaculture resources and the various transformations of those resources into
products for sale. It is also referred to as the "seafood industry",
although non-food items such as pearls are included among its products.
· The
traditional sector: comprises enterprises and individuals associated with
fisheries resources from which aboriginal people derive products in accordance
with their traditions.
· The recreational
sector: comprises enterprises and individuals associated for the purpose of
recreation, sport or sustenance with fisheries resources from which products
are derived that are not for sale.
Commercial sector
The commercial sector of the fishing industry comprises the
following chain:
1. Commercial
fishing and fish farming which produce the fish
2. Fish processing
which produce the fish products
3. Marketing of the
fish products
World production
Fish are harvested by commercial fishing and aquaculture.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO),
the world harvest in 2005 consisted of 93.3 million tons captured by commercial
fishing in wild fisheries, plus 48.1 million tons produced by fish farms. In
addition, 1.3 million tons of aquatic plants (seaweed etc.) were captured in
wild fisheries and 14.8 million tons were produced by aquaculture.The number of
individual fish caught in the wild has been estimated at 0.97-2.7 trillion per
year (not counting fish farms or marine invertebrates).
Following is a table of the 2011 world fishing industry
harvest in tons by capture and by aquaculture.
Total (ton)
Aquaculture (ton)
Capture (ton)
178,303,426
83,729,313
94,574,113
Total
22,060,504
20,975,361
1,085,143
Aquatic plant
156,202,922
62,753,952
93,488,970
Aquatic animal
Commercial fishing
The top producing countries were, in order, the People's
Republic of China (excluding Hong Kong and Taiwan), Peru, Japan, the
Unitedstates, Chile, Indonesia, Russia, India, Thailand, Norway and Iceland.
Those countries accounted for more than half of the world's production; China
alone accounted for a third of the world's production.
Fish farming
Aquaculture is the cultivation of aquatic organisms. Unlike
fishing, aquaculture, also known as aqua farming, is the cultivation of aquatic
populations under controlled conditions. Mari culture refers to aquaculture
practiced in marine environments. Particular kinds of aquaculture include alga
culture (the production of kelp/seaweed and other algae); fish farming; shrimp
farming, shellfish farming, and the growing of cultured pearls.
Fish farming involves raising fish commercially in tanks or
enclosed pools, usually for food. Fish species raised by fish farms include
carp, salmon, tilapia, catfish and cod. Increasing demands on wild fisheries by
commercial fishing operations have caused widespread overfishing. Fish farming
offers an alternative solution to the increasing market demand for fish and
fish protein.
Fish processing
Fish processing is the processing of fish delivered by
commercial fisheries and fish farms. The larger fish processing companies have
their own fishing fleets and independent fisheries. The products of the
industry are usually sold wholesale to grocery chains or to intermediaries.
Fish processing can be subdivided into two categories: fish
handling (the initial processing of raw fish) and fish products manufacturing.
Aspects of fish processing occur on fishing vessels, fish processing vessels,
and at fish processing plants.
Another natural subdivision is into primary processing
involved in the filleting and freezing of fresh fish for onward distribution to
fresh fish retail and catering outlets, and the secondary processing that
produces chilled, frozen and canned products for the retail and catering
trades.
Fish products
Fisheries are estimated to currently provide 16% of the
world population's protein. The flesh of many fish is primarily valued as a
source of food; there are many edible species of fish. Other marine life taken
as food includes shellfish, crustaceans, sea cucumber, jellyfish and roe.
Fish and other marine life are also be used for many other
uses: pearls and mother-of-pearl, sharkskin and ray skin. Sea horses, star
fish, sea urchins and sea cucumber are used in traditional Chinese medicine.
Tyrian purple is a pigment made from marine snails, sepia is a pigment made
from the inky secretions of cuttlefish. Fish glue has long been valued for its
use in all manner of products. Isinglass is used for the clarification of wine
and beer. Fish emulsion is a fertilizer emulsion that is produced from the
fluid remains of fish processed for fish oil and fish meal.
In the industry the term seafood products is often used
instead of fish products.
Fish marketing
Fish markets are marketplace used for the trade in and sale
of fish and other seafood. They can be dedicated to wholesale trade between
fishermen and fish merchants, or to the sale of seafood to individual
consumers, or to both. Retail fish markets, a type of wet market, often sell
street food as well.
Most shrimp are sold frozen and are marketed in different
categories. The live food fish trade is a global system that links fishing
communities with markets.
Traditional sector
The traditional fishing industry, or artisan fishing, are
terms used to describe small scale commercial or subsistence fishing practices,
particularly using traditional techniques such as rod and tackle, arrows and
harpoons, throw nets and drag nets, etc. It does not usually cover the concept
of fishing for sport, and might be used when talking about the pressures
between large scale modern commercial fishing practices and traditional
methods, or when aid programs are targeted specifically at fishing at or near
subsistence levels.
Recreational sector
The recreational fishing industry consists of enterprises
such as the manufacture and retailing of fishing tackle and apparel, the
payment of license fees to regulatory authorities, fishing books and magazines,
the design and building of recreational fishing boats, and the provision of
accommodation, fishing boats for charter, and guided fishing adventures.
International problems
The ocean covers 71% of the earth's surface and 80% of the
value of exploited marine resources are attributed to the fishing industry. The
fishing industry has provoked various international disputes as wild fish
capture rose to a peak about the turn of the century, and has since started a
gradual decline. Iceland, Japan, and Portugal are the greatest consumers of
seafood per capita in the world.
Problems in the Americas
Chile and Peru are countries with high fish consumption, and
therefore had troubles regarding fish industry. In 1947, Chile and Peru first
adopted the 200 nautical miles of Exclusive Economic Zone for their shore, and
in 1982, UN formally adopted this term. In 2000s, Chile and Peru suffered
serious fish crisis because of excessive fishing and lack of proper
regulations, and now political power play in the area is rekindled.From the
late 1950s, offshore bottom trawlers began exploiting the deeper part, leading
to a large catch increase and a strong decline in the underlying biomass. The
stock collapsed to extremely low levels in the early 1990s and this is a
well-known example of non-excludable, non-rivalrous public good in economics,
causing free-rider problems.
Problems in Europe
Iceland is one of the largest consumers in the world and in
1972, a dispute occurred between UK and Iceland because of Iceland’s
announcement of Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) to reduce overfishing. This
dispute is called the Cod War, direct confrontations between Icelandic patrol
vessels and British warships. Nowadays in Europe in general, countries are
searching for a way to recover fishing industry. Overfishing of EU fisheries is
costing 3.2 billion euros a year and 100,000 jobs according to a report. So
Europe is constantly looking for some collective actions to prevent
overfishing.
Problems in Asia
Japan, China and Korea are some of the greatest consumers of
fish, and have some disputes over Exclusive Economic Zone. In 2011, due to a
serious earthquake, the nuclear power facility in Fukushima was damaged. Ever
since, huge amount of contaminated water leaked and is entering the oceans.
Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) admitted that around 300 tons of highly
radioactive water had leaked from a storage tank on the site. In the Kuroshio
Current, the sea near Fukushima, about 11 countries catch fish. Not only the
surrounding countries such as Japan, Korea and China, but also the countries
like Ukraine, Spain and Russia have boats in the Kuroshio Current. In September
2013, South Korea banned all fish imports from eight Japanese prefectures,
concerning radioactive water leak from the Fukushima nuclear plant.
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