Crayfish ban

[ex Elly 274]

Govt orders 5-year crayfishing ban on North Island’s upper east coast

The Government has announced a sweeping ban on spiny rock lobster fishing along the upper east coast of the North Island, in a bid to rebuild depleted stocks and protect marine ecosystems.

Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones confirmed today the “milestone” closure will take effect from April 1 next year and will remain in place for five years or until crayfish numbers recover sufficiently to allow fishing to resume.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/govt-orders-5-year-crayfishing-ban-on-north-islands-upper-east-coast/IEIX2C26CJEWXP5LTIW2LEY5T4/

 

[ex Elly 274]

So we already have a scallop ban. Now a crayfish ban.  What next?

 

[Sail Rock 34]

About time

[Frank 201]

The next ban will be on overfishing and stock collapse due to tragically  inept management of the fishery.

The only parties holding their breath will be the fish !!

[waikiore 514]

While the commercial Snapper length is significantly smaller than the recreational, people will not respect the rules, and do Iwi have to comply with this new rule?

[K4309 446]

22 hours ago, ex Elly said:

Govt orders 5-year crayfishing ban on North Island’s upper east coast

The Government has announced a sweeping ban on spiny rock lobster fishing along the upper east coast of the North Island, in a bid to rebuild depleted stocks and protect marine ecosystems.

Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones confirmed today the “milestone” closure will take effect from April 1 next year and will remain in place for five years or until crayfish numbers recover sufficiently to allow fishing to resume.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/govt-orders-5-year-crayfishing-ban-on-north-islands-upper-east-coast/IEIX2C26CJEWXP5LTIW2LEY5T4/

 

Correction required to that.

It's not a ban for everyone, only white men. Same as the new white men only marine reserves (HPA's).

The natives are still allowed to take as much as they like, of whatever size they like, in berry, the whole lot.

And there is no way we can find out how much they are taking, while we all sit and watch. MPI wont release the customary take data, because, err, it's sensitive.

Don't get me wrong, the ban is long overdue. But it should be a total ban, not a race based ban.

And before the happy clappy's point out the natives are Kaitiaki, lets point to the authorised customary fisher from Gisborne who was poaching for 10 years in Tai Tokerau. I've had rellies on a Bert Monroe motorbike ride in Southland feasting on 'customary' taken seaford. Is just a feckin rort.

The te Matani Festival (spelling?) has a feast with customary take seafood. They feed something like 100,000 people with it. Really stretching the definition of customary when you are talking a large commercial scale cultural festival. I might have the exact numbers wrong, but it is in the several 10's of 1,000's. My point is this isn't small scale 'cottage industry' take, it's massive.

[Psyche 896]

11 minutes ago, K4309 said:

Correction required to that.

It's not a ban for everyone, only white men. Same as the new white men only marine reserves (HPA's).

The natives are still allowed to take as much as they like, of whatever size they like, in berry, the whole lot.

And there is no way we can find out how much they are taking, while we all sit and watch. MPI wont release the customary take data, because, err, it's sensitive.

Don't get me wrong, the ban is long overdue. But it should be a total ban, not a race based ban.

And before the happy clappy's point out the natives are Kaitiaki, lets point to the authorised customary fisher from Gisborne who was poaching for 10 years in Tai Tokerau. I've had rellies on a Bert Monroe motorbike ride in Southland feasting on 'customary' taken seaford. Is just a feckin rort.

The te Matani Festival (spelling?) has a feast with customary take seafood. They feed something like 100,000 people with it. Really stretching the definition of customary when you are talking a large commercial scale cultural festival. I might have the exact numbers wrong, but it is in the several 10's of 1,000's. My point is this isn't small scale 'cottage industry' take, it's massive.

K, I appreciate you feel strongly about this but apart from there being a treaty between the indigenous peoples of NZ and the crown which is a nuanced, complex discussion well above and beyond talk radio resentment and outrage, the fact is that tangata whenua are a tiny minority on the water and there are rules they must follow as well. Resentful anecdotes about Maori enjoying their customary rights might be balanced out by having really good look around see which racial majority benefits most from NZ's democracy.

The cray ban is lip service, too little and too late. Barrier and the Kings are getting raped, it is well understood that crays were being overfished for decades and the "voluntary ban" by commercial is a joke- its just not economic . Speak to anyone who has dived for crays or scallops over the last 40 years, they all tell the same story which is remember the good old days. Seriously the fishery is a victim of greed plain and simple, the fishing industry has slowly but surely systematically strip mined our fishery. Recreational is/was also way too generous with limits but that take while not insignificant is still a fraction of commercial. 

[K4309 446]

2 hours ago, Psyche said:

K, I appreciate you feel strongly about this but apart from there being a treaty between the indigenous peoples of NZ and the crown which is a nuanced, complex discussion well above and beyond talk radio resentment and outrage, the fact is that tangata whenua are a tiny minority on the water and there are rules they must follow as well. Resentful anecdotes about Maori enjoying their customary rights might be balanced out by having really good look around see which racial majority benefits most from NZ's democracy.

The cray ban is lip service, too little and too late. Barrier and the Kings are getting raped, it is well understood that crays were being overfished for decades and the "voluntary ban" by commercial is a joke- its just not economic . Speak to anyone who has dived for crays or scallops over the last 40 years, they all tell the same story which is remember the good old days. Seriously the fishery is a victim of greed plain and simple, the fishing industry has slowly but surely systematically strip mined our fishery. Recreational is/was also way too generous with limits but that take while not insignificant is still a fraction of commercial. 

On your second paragraph, you are possibly misunderstanding my position. I agree with you whole heartedly on that. This ban is long overdue. I have never eaten a NZ crayfish, primarily for this reason. I don't want to be part of the collapse of the whole ecosystem, with respect to kina barrens and the wider impact of that on juvenile fish habitat.

But I'm not really following the point of your first paragraph. I do note that it appears politically incorrect to question any race based rules in large parts of our society today. I don't think that is healthy. Most people are just too scared to question race based rules for fear of various criticisms. Talk privately to people and their views are stronger / different. Sure it may be seen as inflammatory to use the term native. But the reality is that is who we are talking about. Conversely I get annoyed being referred to as a coloniser, and or being blamed for wrongs that happened 200 years ago. That said, I do feel it's important to share differences of opinion in a respectful manner, so my apologies if I was pushing the boundaries of being respectful with my previous post.

But one thing I would like to question you on is the assertion that the customary take is small (by implication from your comment that tangata whenua is a tiny minority on the water). My underlying issue with customary take isn't that it is customary take per se, but that we have no idea how much and of what size is being taken. Transparency. Or the lack of transparency. MPI have refused OIA requests on this matter. So we are just guessing how big the customary take is. As stated in my previous post I have anecdotal evidence that customary take is being abused, and in instances it is far from minor. Given also that 19% of the population identify as Maori, I wouldn't say that is a tiny minority. Granted that identify as Maori doesn't equate to tungate whenua directly.

But what we also know is there are existing problems with poaching and black market seafood. Where there is money to be made, laws get broken. There is zero transparency around the customary take, and to reinforce that, we already have examples of customary title holders who have been convicted of poaching over the last 10 years. Generally where there is smoke there is fire.

Now, the paradox here is I actively support Ngati Manahuri's proposed ban on intertidal gathering (the bucket people ban), and other thing such as the closure of the Whangateau Harbour to cockle picking. BUT, my strongly held view is that it should not be race based organisations making those calls, it should be organisations that represent our wider society (Councils or Govt). However, it is what it is based on our history and the 3 paragraph document from 200 years ago that dictates it all.

Anyway, the main point of my previous post was to highlight that it's not a total ban on crayfish, if you belong to the right hapu you can still go get what you want. I think it's important that people understand there are loopholes in all these fisheries protection measures.

PS, my position on this is largely driven by the same issues with the HPA's. Crayfish themselves are just one species, but the loopholes around HPA's make them fairly close to pointless (effectively the only people actually banned from HPA's are white men), double so when commercial can come and take all the food sources out of two of the HPA's, so the rest of the ecosystem suffers.

[waikiore 514]

P re your first paragraph on which group benefits from the commercial take- Iwi led organisations currently control 65% plus of all NZ quota . A fact not often understood.