Last Wednesday, at the European Seafood Exposition in Brussels, 80 Greenpeace activists protested at the stands of five large tuna suppliers.
Protesters covered the stands with fishing nets, chained themselves to the stands and put up banners saying 'Time and Tuna running out'. A message was also broadcast through the exhibition halls' public address systems urging traders to buy only sustainably-caught seafood. The organisation is calling on the companies to stop trading in bluefin, yellowfin and bigeye tuna and other unsustainably caught tuna until stocks recover.
"These companies are major players in the tuna industry and are jointly destroying tuna stocks by overfishing and using destructive fishing methods", said Sebastian Losada, Greenpeace Spain Oceans Campaigner. "Blatant overfishing will lead to commercial extinction of many tuna stocks in the near future unless urgent action is taken."
"Tuna stocks are at a critically low level with too many vessels fishing for too few fish. High levels of bycatch of other marine life is a serious problem", said Losada. "If the industry doesn't shift towards sustainable seafood there will simply be no fish left to trade, and their businesses will be closed forever."
