Mail & Guardian
Mail & Guardian

Fishing

latest news & developments
CONSERVATION

Illegal gillnetting in South Africa: New reporting app targets growing threat to rivers and estuaries

Conservationists and law enforcement agencies in South Africa are launching a new Gillnet Reporting App to combat the rising problem of illegal gillnetting in rivers and…

  • Sheree Bega
5 min read
A group of African penguins are seen during a rehabilitation session in Cape Town, South Africa on March 22, 2022. African penguins, whose populations have fallen sharply in the last century, may become extinct in the next few decades, experts say. File photo by Murat Ozgur Guvendik/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
AFRICAN PENGUINS

Creecy hauled to court over ‘irrational’ closures around penguin colonies

The closures sound the ‘death knell’ for the seabirds

  • Sheree Bega
7 min read
Migrants of various nationalities are rescued by the Spanish NGO Open Arms in international waters on September 30, 2023. The migrants are from Syria, Bangladesh, Sudan, Eritrea, Palestine, Guinea, Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Ghana, Egypt, Chat, Senegal and Mali. (Photo by Jose Colon/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
AFRICA

Europe brewed its so-called ‘migrant crisis’

Decades before today’s migrants boarded small boats to Europe to ‘take their jobs’, European fishing ships were trawling West African waters, taking food and jobs from the…

  • The Continent
  • Jaume Portell
  • Èlia Borràs
6 min read
The writer says Mining became an economic pillar because South Africa chose to develop it. Offshore oil and gas could do the same if we choose to.
DRILLING

TotalEnergies’ project to drill exploration wells on southwest coast hits pushback

Concentrate on renewable energy, rather than putting the sensitive habitats and species, whales at risk by drilling exploration wells

  • Sheree Bega
6 min read
(David Harrison/M&G)
ABALONE

A fight for survival: How West Coast fishers have stayed afloat in the pandemic

Small-scale fishers, abalone farmers, commercial trawlers, poachers: all have been affected, if not by fishing quotas, then by the pandemic

  • Eunice Masson
7 min read
Protestors at the Waterfront waiting the arrival of the Amazon Warrior . They are against the planned Shell seismic survey for oil and gas in the ocean on November 21, 2021 in Cape Town, South Africa. It is reported that Shell has announced that it will carry out a three-dimensional seismic survey in search of oil and gas deposits from Morgan Bay to Port St Johns off the Wild Coast. (Photo by Brenton Geach/Gallo Images via Getty Images)
BARBARA CREECY

Battlelines drawn over new seismic survey on the West Coast

The Legal Resources Centre and Richard Spoor Attorneys are heading to court for urgent interdict against Searcher Seismic, an Australian exploration outfit

  • Sheree Bega
5 min read
The minimum lifetime cost to South Africa of the plastic produced in 2019 is a staggering R885,34-billion. (Raneen Sawafta/Reuters)
BARBARA CREECY

Plastic pollution in 2019 cost South Africa staggering R885bn

Yet plans are underway to import more plastic waste into the country and it has not signed global plastics treaty

  • Sheree Bega
7 min read
The documentary ‘Seaspiracy’ is a textbook display of disingenuous interviewing. (Wikipedia)
ALI TABRIZI

Screen Grab: Deeply shallow

The documentary ‘Seaspiracy’ is a textbook display of disingenuous interviewing

  • Carlos Amato
4 min read
As we celebrate World Ocean Day, it is vital we recognise the importance of protecting areas beyond our national jurisdiction. (Dwayne Senior/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
AFRICA

Africa must protect the high seas before it’s too late

We must act now to secure the world’s oceans as a common good — and prevent catastrophic repercussions, argues Halemariam Desalegn

  • Hailemariam Desalegn
4 min read
FARMING

Nigerian farmers hail Shell ruling, but future remains uncertain

A Dutch court has ordered the energy company’s Nigerian subsidiary to pay farmers compensation over oil spills

  • Linus Unah
  • Kelechukwu Iruoma
5 min read
Call of the sea: Marine biologist Dr Sara Andreotti says sharks must be managed as a sustainable resource for our blue economy. Photo: Stefan Els/Matie Media
ALGOA BAY

Why great white sharks are disappearing from South Africa’s coastline

Government panel blames killer whales for the depleted population of great white sharks, but experts say overfishing is the big culprit that is not being addressed

  • Sheree Bega
8 min read
Leaked documents and an affidavit from a whistleblower working at a major Western fishing company operating in African waters have given rare insight into how food multinationals can shift profits around the world to avoid paying taxes in developing countries.
ATLANTEX

A fishy business: How an Icelandic multinational moved profits out of Namibia

Global food companies avoid paying taxes by shifting profits around the world. Finance Uncovered reports on the case of Icelandic fishing giant Samherji’s operations in Namibia

  • Margot Gibbs
10 min read
Unlocked: The message on my cell phone’s voicemail today is: ‘Gone fishing, back on Monday’. (Delwyn Verasamy/M&G)
CABINET

Don’t take the bait, Dr Killjoy

I’m going fishing on Friday. Watch the sun rise, smoke a spliff, tangle a line in the sea. Unless NDZ is tempted to do a level U-turn

  • Paddy Harper
4 min read
(Paul Botes/M&G)
COVID 19

Virus leaves fishing high and dry

The recreational fishing industry, employing 94 000 people and generating R36-billion a year, pleads for permission to return to work before it collapses

  • Paddy Harper
5 min read
Dr Amber Childs and Professor Paul Cowley surgically implanting a transmitter in a juvenile dusky kob in the Sundays Estuary. (Photo: Dr Tor Næsje)
DR TOR NAESJE

Fish species overexploited or collapsed

No-take zones in estuaries may be the solution

  • Professor Paul Cowley
  • Dr Tor Naesje
4 min read