End of the Line The End of the Line asks people to imagine an ocean without fish. Zoom In

‘The End of the Line’ film reveals the inconvenient truth about the fisheries

08-06-2009

Today, more than 50 cinemas across the UK and Europe will screen ‘The End of the Line’, the first major feature documentary about the global overfishing crisis. Based on the hard-hitting book by environmental journalist Charles Clover, the film is being launched on the World Oceans Day, which for the first time this year is officially recognised by the United Nations. 

The film’s message is stark: greedy and reckless over-exploitation is driving global fish stocks towards catastrophe and inflicting massive collateral damage on the wider marine environment.  The fundamental problem is the gross over-capacity of the modern fishing fleet, combing the oceans relentlessly in pursuit of dwindling fish stocks; in short there are too many boats chasing too few fish.

According to the film, ‘The global fishing capacity could catch the world catch four times over. The world’s long-lining industry sets 1.4 billion hooks every year.  These are estimated to be set on enough line to encircle the entire globe more than 500 times.’  This is killing at least 300,000 seabirds annually, including 100,000 albatrosses and threatening 18 out of 22 species with extinction.  A heavy toll on seabirds is also taken by trawling and gill-nets.

The film ends with a message of hope, challenging society to take action on three critical fronts – reduce the size of the fleet, protect the oceans with a network of marine reserves off limits to fishing, and harness consumer choice to purchase only fish certified as sustainable.

With the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) currently under review, it is telling that the film has been given the thumbs-up by Joe Borg, European Commissioner for Maritime affairs and Fisheries. ‘The End of the Line’ is the wake-up call for the marine environment as ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ proved to be for global warming. 

For more information on the film click on:
http://endoftheline.com