Foreign Correspondent Shines Spotlight On Aquarium Fish Trade

November 8, 2004

Release from: Port Vila Presse (Vanatu)

It seems the world can’t get enough of ‘Nemo’, the cute clownfish star of the animated blockbuster, Finding Nemo. But as a result of all the attention, it’s more about saving Nemo than finding him.

Foreign Correspondent, one of the most popular current affairs programmes in Australia has put together a special programme on the aquarium trade in Vanuatu which will be aired on Tuesday night.

A press release from ABC has been circulated by email stating, “Foreign Correspondent’s Mark Corcoran travelled to the Pacific Islands nation of Vanuatu to investigate aquarium fish trade, the developing world’s latest growth industry - now catching 20 million tropical fish a year ˆ but in Vanuatu it‚s a business accused of exploitation, corruption and over-fishing.

Nearly all Vanuatu’s tropical fish are caught by a company called Sustainable Reef Supplies (SRS) which was established in Vanuatu by American businessmen.

Yet in three short years, SRS has managed to alienate tourism operators who depend on tropical fish as an attraction, scientists who fear an ecological disaster in the making ˆ and traditional owners of the reefs where the tropical fish live.

Foreign Correspondent meets one custom reef owner Chief Mormor, who gets paid just $120 a month by SRS for the right to unlimited access to his reefs. He figures it’s better than nothing.

Yet a former SRS consultant James Armitage tells Foreign Correspondent that SRS collects $5,000 worth of fish in a single morning on Chief Mormor’s reef.

An exotic flame angel fish sells for $80 in Australia or the US but Vanuatu will receive just 24 cents.

Vanuatu’s Fisheries Department is supposed to monitor the trade, but does virtually nothing.

“The actual fellow who came to set up SRS was blatant about it and was willing to offer it” in his words “that’s how we did it in Fiji, that’s how we did it in Indonesia and we’ll do it here” he said.

The Press Release went on “A just completed scientific study assisted by scientists from Townsville’s James Cook University suggests that SRS operations have already had a significant impact on fish numbers, with a 50% reduction in tropical fish numbers on reefs that have been harvested.”

Fisheries claim the report by experts is not true. The full Foreign Correspondent programme will be aired on Tuesday on ABC.