"You do realise this is a military zone?"
Why we need to bring the Ocean out from behind the closed doors of Brussels.
To mark the beginning of Ocean Week, Ocean Rebellion ripped open a giant can of Petit Navire tuna in Brussels’ iconic Place du Luxembourg (outside the EU Parliament).
The tin, dead sailor and attendant suited fish heads (representing the callous industrial tuna industry) highlight the combined threats industrial tuna fisheries pose to both human life and marine biodiversity. A diversity that goes beyond juvenile yellowfin tuna to include sharks, turtles, dolphins and whales.
We also unfurled the world’s largest screen print of a bottom trawling net. ‘The Net’ was raced across the the esplanade of the EU Parliament by the hands of many concerned EU citizens – despite the claims we were acting in a military zone!
Unfurling ‘The Net’ also marks another year in which the EU has failed to stop the EU industrial fleet from trashing the seabed, needlessly slaughtering tonnes of marine life and overfishing coastal waters across the world.
The Net
‘The Net’ is hand crafted and comprises over 1,000 individual screen prints. But it isn’t created to break world records. Its size represents not the length of a bottom trawling net—but the width of the jaws at its mouth. Bottom trawling nets are so huge that ten jumbo jets can fit inside (Oceanographic).
These huge bottom trawling nets are weighted and dragged across the seabed destroying corals, sea grass and catching any marine life in their path. This means countless sea turtles, dolphins, sharks and smaller fish are suffocated by the greed of EU industrial fisheries (under the protection of the EU leaders) and then just thrown overboard. This accounts for 93% of all discards* in the EU; once bottom trawling is history, discards will almost end.
*Discards are what the fishing industry calls unwanted 'coincidentally' slaughtered marine life. Bottom trawling is the most wastefully stupid method of fishing ever invented.
Art bomb interventions
Ocean Rebellion is an international grassroots art collective which tackles Ocean degradation and biodiversity loss by conceiving playful, emotive and spectacular ‘art bombs’.
Some of us (myself, and Roc) are part of both Absurd Intelligence and Ocean Rebellion. Nearly everyone from Absurd Intelligence has this activist and activating background, a history of using direct action, political stunts and public pressure to bring about change.
Our tactics have evolved over the years. We celebrate and revel in click-bait interventions which are irresistible to legacy, trade and social media, attracting up to a billion media impressions a year and applying direct pressure on erring stakeholders while raising public awareness as well as incentivising policy makers to serve, not kill, the Ocean.
Because as the sea dies we die.
So we went to Brussels where the EU citizens were gathering at the EU Parliament for Ocean Week, to highlight their concern over inaction on Ocean policies.
It’s no good discussing these issues behind closed doors. It’s time to make the restoration of a healthy Ocean THE issue across Europe.
So that’s what we aimed for.
Exploitation has to end
In attracting media attention with these highly colourful and photogenic interventions, we were able to amplify our calls for the European Parliament to adopt an ambitious resolution ‘on the role of social, economic and environmental standards in safeguarding fair competition for all aquatic food products and improving food security’.
Which is a longwinded way of telling industrial fishing to stop exploiting workers and stop overfishing the Ocean.
The Portuguese MEP Paulo Do Nascimento Cabral states the resolution:
“Emphasises the crucial role of labour rights, the employment of women and young people, fair wages and a safe working environment in ensuring fair and ethical practices in fisheries” and “Stresses that innovation is crucial to develop sustainable fishing practices and gear, minimising the environmental impact, reducing fuel consumption and bycatches”.
For years, European tuna brands like Petit Navire, owned and operated by global tuna mega giant Thai Union, have sold their tuna as ‘sustainable’ by using the Blue Tick mark of “trusted” brand, the Marine Stewardship Council, or MSC.
In recent years however, evidence has emerged of significant cases of forced labour in MSC fisheries. Yet, the MSC still does not care.
They casually wash their hands of the problem by saying that their “main mission is environmental” and that their “ecolabel does not make claims about social conditions”. In effect the MSC have said and keep saying
“Hey, we think it’s no problem that the can of Petit Navire tuna sold in supermarkets across the European Union is certified by us as ‘sustainable’ – EVEN IF IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN CAUGHT BY A CHILD SLAVE, OR ON A VESSEL WHO’S CAPTAIN WAS MURDERED!”
Olga Martin-Ortega, Professor of International law and lead of the Business, Human Rights and the Environment Research Group is another supporter of the campaign. She said:
“The EU has a unique opportunity to live up to its international human rights and international commitments on human rights and the marine environment as well as sending a clear message to other states, international organisations and businesses that we all have an urgent and shared responsibility to protect all life at sea.”
And we agree, of course. There should be no slavery at sea (or anywhere).
Ocean Rebellion’s demands
We may be small, but we know what we’re talking about. What we need is:
- Portuguese MEP Paulo Do Nascimento Cabral’s resolution to be strengthened by the adoption of a few crucial amendments. And that these recommendations are taken onboard by the European Commission and the European Council, notably Amendments 98 and 99 to the resolution which “Considers that voluntary certification schemes should go beyond the minimum international social standards, such as those established by the ILO and the IMO, and ensure proper controls and audits of the certified fisheries;” and “Regrets that over the years the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) third party certification has lost credibility and is misleading in many cases, by certifying unsustainable fisheries and failing to address labor abuses and human rights violations in certified fisheries; considers that a profound reform of such third party certification is needed with the adoption of rigorous social, labour rights and environmental standards and improved traceability and governance, to the benefit of the marine environment, consumers, seafarers but also fisheries and seafood companies that adopt stringent standards and are therefore facing unfair competition;”.
- Also the MSC must strike off vessels caught abusing crew from its certified vessel list and to include social and labour rights in its ‘MSC Fisheries Standard’, the standard by which (so-called) sustainability of tuna fisheries are measured.
- Plus supermarket brands across the world must stop selling tuna which might have been caught by modern day slaves. European supermarket chains must also sign up to the Geneva Declaration on Human Rights at Sea, and the the European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) action CA23103 on ‘Life, liberty and health: ensuring universal protection of human rights at sea (BlueRights)‘, initiatives designed to bolster the protection of human rights in the fisheries sector.
- And finally, Ocean Rebellion demands all European lawmakers, EU Council members and the EU Commission to recognise and take action to protect human rights abuses and modern-day slavery in industrial tuna fisheries in whatever capacity they can.
We believe another Ocean is possible.
If you think so too, please support our work or join us.
Elsewhere in Absurdity...
Of course, first and foremost a massive good luck to Sophie, Maddy and Charlie and everyone involved in putting on the Rough Trade x Fête of Britain in Liverpool this evening (Friday) 17th and if you’re in town, get along! Full report, images, videos and snapshots in our newsletter next week. Elsewhere...
- Alanna and Charlie went to a Climate Cymru convention in Cardiff to connect with organisations doing the dot-joining work of climate and inequality in the run-up to a Welsh election where Labour are tanking, and Plaid Cymru and Reform are neck-and-neck;
- Charlie also rabble-roused 300 amazing Architecture students at Westminster University about the importance of design in societal change;
- Daze was working hard at Cheltenham Literature Festival which she does every year, going by the amount of books that get delivered at Absurd Towers for her judging duties;
- And finally Alex is off to the Hey! Festival in Newhaven on Saturday for an afternoon of reading, writing, stories from Gaza with Ahmed Alnaouq and Umi Sinha, and lots more, put on by the wonderful author Nick Royle. Come along to Hillcrest Community Centre Newhaven BN9 9LH 2-6pm, flyer below.
