A Summary of Seaspiracy; A Shock to the System

Seaspiracy hit the headlines a few months ago as it exposed some of the devastating activities taking place in our fishing industry. Thousands of individuals took to social media to express their shock and sadness at the destruction that is occurring without our knowledge in the ocean. Many described the documentary as an ‘eyeopener’ and ‘life changing’ whilst others stated they would cut back or even totally eliminate fish from their diet. The shocking and controversial documentary was made by the team who created the award-winning Cowspiracy and is narrated and filmed by Ali Tabrizi. He sets out to discover more about the global fishing industry but finds a web of alarming and illegal practices taking place, meaning the documentary goes a lot further than simply focussing on seafood. Whether you are in two minds as to whether to watch this documentary or just haven’t found the time yet, here is a run down of Ali’s journey across the world highlighting the most pressing issues he uncovered.

The programme starts by reminding us that 80% of all life on Earth resides in the ocean, making the destruction we are causing to this ecosystem even more disturbing. His first trip takes him to a Japanese town called Taiji where dolphins are known to be herded into the cove by fishermen. Even an outsider simply visiting the town caused the police to be notified as the fishing industry is so keen to have their activities remain under the radar. Ali and his partner did however manage to capture footage of hundreds of dolphins being driven into the cove by boats before the mammals were devastatingly killed. Seaspiracy stated that the reason for this is pest control, as fishermen believe that dolphins form a large competitor to the ocean’s tuna stocks which are a highly valuable catch in the markets. Whilst it is thought fishermen may have believed this in the past, others have since commented that this area of Japan has a long history of whaling and the local practice is simply continuing. Yet others state that dolphin meat is not a popular delicacy in Japan and that the large scale drive hunting taking place there today contradicts the traditional hunting methods where relatively few animals were taken. It may be that many dolphins are caught and kept alive and sent to marine parks which are far more profitable. Whichever scenario is true, the killing or entrapment of dolphins, or any marine mammal, is devastating to our oceans. These large creatures form some of the largest predators in the food chain and reducing their numbers could massively impact the rest of our aquatic life. Unlike fish, mammals are also slower to reproduce, making it much more difficult for a population to recover from overharvesting.

Ali then moves onto Hong Kong where he talks about a similar issue with sharks and the shark finning industry. In parts of Asia, a bowl of shark fin soup can be sold for $100 and is often a sign of high status. Yet once again as he approached the fish markets and docks, he was told to put all cameras away as they did not want their activities to be broadcast. Shark finning, the process of cutting off a shark’s fin often whilst the creature is still alive, is illegal in most countries but still continues throughout the Pacific and Indian Oceans. As a top apex predator, sharks are an essential part of our ocean ecosystems. If sharks disappear, the prey they normally eat will be able to thrive without limit, eating all the prey below them until the prey population crashes, causing the new top predators to suffer a sudden lack of food and decline also. Seabirds are also surprisingly at risk if we lose our shark species and already, 70% of seabirds have disappeared since the 1950s. Sharks often drive schools of fish to the surface of the ocean whilst hunting and this allows birds to feed off fish at the sea’s surface. Of course, this is not the only issue impacting seabird numbers but it is yet another unforeseen consequence of human actions. Seaspiracy makes the thought-provoking point that we should not be afraid of sharks living in the ocean, we should be afraid of NO sharks living in the ocean. Around 10 humans die from shark attacks each year, yet 11,000-13,000 sharks are killed per hour by humans, many as bycatch.

40% of all marine life caught globally is thrown straight back overboard as bycatch. An Icelandic fishery was used as a poignant example which helped bring this statistic home. In a single month, the fishery caught 269 porpoises, 900 seals and 5,000 seabirds as bycatch. This is just one fishery in one country and yet the numbers are already shocking before being scaled up to cover a global scale. There are thought to be 4.6 million commercial fishing vessels in the world, many operating in the middle of vast oceans and so it is impossible to enforce fishing laws that are in place, however organisations such as Sea Shepherd are voluntarily trying to attempt what governments are failing at by directly approaching boats carrying out illegal activities. The organisation claims that they discovered one vessel which killed 45 dolphins as bycatch just to catch eight tuna for sale. It is thought that this vessel was certified as providing dolphin friendly tuna. Incredibly, the organisation which awards dolphin friendly tuna labels admitted that they really don’t know what happens at sea and they simply have to take the captains’ word for it. Observers are sent out on vessels but they can often be bribed or sometimes even thrown overboard by the crew who are desperate to feed their profits.

After discussing the issue of tuna and bycatch in depth, the documentary moves on to talk about plastic but takes a perspective we don’t often hear. Seaspiracy points out that 46% of the plastic in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is actually derived from fishing gear, whether that is buoys, buckets, nets or crates. With this in mind, it now sounds unbelievable that plastic straws are filling newspaper headlines when in actuality, straws only account for 0.03% of all plastic entering the ocean! Of course, if each and every one of us reduce our plastic consumption at home we really can make an enormous difference to the ocean but that doesn’t mean that we are fully to blame and the only ones who need to be readjusting. The documentary also takes a couple of minutes to talk about climate change and the importance of healthy marine animal and plant species to help tackle this issue before moving back onto large scale fishing.

At this point, Seaspiracy focusses on the enormous fishing vessels which are like factory warehouses processing fish. It highlights that 2.7 trillion fish are killed every year; no other industry on Earth kills this many animals, let alone wild ones, many of which we are yet to understand properly. Due to this shocking fact, the documentary likens fishing to wildlife poaching and when you hear that some trawling nets could fit 13 jumbo jets inside them, you start to understand why. The documentary looks into marine protected areas, of which an overwhelming majority still allow fishing and oil drilling to take place within their boundaries. Ali then heads to Liberia where illegal fishing is rife. Many governments heavily subsidise fishing to help keep prices artificially low as our oceans’ fish stocks are now so small that fish prices should be extortionately high. In fact, $35 billion a year goes into fishing subsidies worldwide, the exact same figure that the UN calculated would be needed to combat world hunger. At night off the coast of Liberia, many EU subsidised vessels head out to fish which is leaving local subsistence fishermen with tiny catches, meaning many on the mainland are forced to switch to bushmeat diets which was a contributing factor to the outbreak of Ebola.

One of the final issues Seaspiracy dives into is fish farming. It is often thought that fish farming is a sustainable solution but it appears far from the perfect answer. 50% of our fish already comes from fish farms but many of these are run by billion dollar companies which are very effective at limiting what information is released. Travelling to Scottish salmon farms, Ali discovers that many of the fish are being eaten alive by sea lice whilst others die young from various diseases. Alarmingly, farmed salmon is actually grey, with the classic pink colour later being added artificially during processing. Shrimp farming in Asia is also highlighted as over a third of all mangroves which have been deforested have been done so to make room for shrimp farming. Whilst in Thailand, Ali also discovers that fishing has become so unprofitable that slave labour is rife, with fishermen often suffering violence, abuse and even death whilst working at sea. To round off the documentary, Ali goes full circle and relooks at the issue of whaling in the Faroe Islands, possibly the most heart-breaking scenes of the entire programme.

Seaspiracy is undeniably a fantastic yet disturbing eye opener into the often hidden world of fishing, yet since its release, there has been some dispute over some of the ideas and facts. The fishing industry involves some of the world’s biggest players such as governments, billion dollar companies and even mafia type groups, each of which are extremely good at hiding their activities and any negative information. This means it can be difficult to know what is really occurring and combined with the fact that we know less about the oceans than we do about the surface of the moon, there has been an enormous conversation started surrounding this controversial documentary. However, Seaspiracy is a brilliant starting point although it seems essential that each of us carries out our own further research and makes our own decisions when it comes to fish consumption and protecting our planet. Despite the horrific scenes shown in Seaspiracy, viewers are left with this one powerful line from marine biologist, oceanographer and explorer Sylvia Earle: ‘Most of the positive and negative things that bring about change in human civilisation start with someone, some ONE, and no one can do everything but everyone can do something’.

By Neve McCracken-Heywood