By Coty Perry

The general consensus is that conservation ends with the monster boats and commercial fishermen who do this for a living. That’s not the case, never has been, and never will be. Even as recreational anglers we owe it to ourselves and our environment to take this seriously. The time is now and the stakes have never been higher. 

More than three billion people around the world rely on fish as their primary protein source. 12% of the world relies on fisheries for this protein with 90% of them being small-scale fishing operations. These are family-owned businesses for generations. These are the people suffering from government subsidies and overfishing. 

To truly understand how complex this issue is, we must all take a moment to analyze what is causing hardship amongst coastal communities and the mass death of marine life. While pollution, plastic, and oil are the cause of death for more than hundreds of thousands of fish each year, illegal fishing and subsidies generate $36.4 billion dollars a year in illegal fishing revenue. This is money taken away from the small fishing communities. 

The fish are being caught faster than they can reproduce and all this money goes to large-scale fish farms and big businesses. Awareness is where difference-making starts. All the regulations put forth in the fishing industry never impact the big guys, only the little guys trying to make a living. 

What was once meant as a means for controlling overfishing and protecting our marine population has continually and excessively done the opposite. It’s time to make a change and that change starts with you.