200 OCEANOGRAPHY 



(/) There seems to he no fjeneral rule that can he adopted hy the nations for 

 the division of the resources of the sea on economic grounds because the eco- 

 nomic needs and the economic systems of the several nations, and the gi*oups 

 of nations, at this time so diverse and distinctive that no agreeable common 

 ground can be found. 



Thu«s conservation of the living resources of the sea is a problem that can 

 affect the ability of the resource to produce at its maximum sustainable level and 

 that can and does bring discord among the nations. It can be solved only 

 through scientitic investigation. The research is expensive in terms of money, 

 equipment, and highly trained personnel. Nevertheless 30-odd years of ex- 

 perience with International Fisheries Connnissions properly staffed and funded 

 shovi' that these problems can be worked out one by one on the basis of research 

 even though they cannot be solved in a general fashion by voting of a large 

 group of sovereign nations. 



What is needed is money for the research. 



DECRE.VSINO COSTS OF P[t()l)rCTIO.\ 



The world ocean is full of living resources which are going to waste for lack 

 of harvesting. Enormous resources are untapped. For instance one of the main 

 resources of our Pacific coast waters is hake, which is not fished steadily at all. 

 One of the main resources of the North Atlantic is the ocean redtish, and this is 

 4sparsel.v fished. 



I'rior to the war it was generally stated that the main high seas resources 

 were iu the Northern Hemisphere and that the tropical seas were mostly barren. 

 Events of the past li> years show this to have been ignorance compounded 

 by economic difficulties. >Since then the great fisheries of South Africa have de- 

 veloped and the enormousl.v expanded tuna fisheries of the tropical seas have 

 only been exposing to view additional untapped food resoux'ces in those seas. In 

 the brief period of 4 years the anchf)vy fisliery of I'eru has expanded from an 

 annual production of practically nothing to over 2 million tons with a reason- 

 able prediction that it can be doubled again without <langer to tiie stock. South- 

 east Asia pre.seiits the classical example of people starving in the midst of plenty. 

 The crowding populations of human rice and fish eaters go hungry surrounded 

 by seas that pullulate with the fish they want and need. 



While there are a lot of complex reasons why this is so the primary one is 

 economic. If there are a group of consumers ashore who will eat fish (and a 

 large shai'e of the world's popiilation are fisheaters by preference), and the 

 ocean is full of fish, the i>robleni is to get the fish out of the ocean at a cost 

 that will put the product on a consumer's plate at a price he will and can pa.v 

 and leave the fisherman enough pay .so that he can buy the boat and e(iuipment 

 he needs and make better wages going to sea than he can b,v staying asliore. 

 Hardly any man is fool enough to take the punishment of the sea life if he can 

 make as good a living at liome ashore witli his family. 



The picture of the small fisherman in a southwe.ster going to sea in his dory 

 waving goodby to his family standing at the door of their shack on the beach 

 has become as old fashioned and outdated as the picture of a dirt farmer 

 scratching his field with a steel tipped wood pole drawn by oxen. There are 

 still millions of such dirt farmers in the world but each one of them does not 

 produce much more food in a year than his famil.v can eat. The big food pro- 

 ducer is tlie farmer with the barn full of expensive machiner.v and three or four 

 hired hands who are mf)re mechanics than they are farmers. The reason for 

 this revolution in land food production was the enormoiis expenditures for agri- 

 cultural research in this century. Where this research has thrived and its re- 

 sults been applied food production has soared much faster than population 

 and there is plenty; where this has not happened there is poverty, .squalor and 

 famine. 



In the ocean fisheries the same thing is going forward but more slowly be- 

 cause the research base has not Iteen built. But even now. although there are 

 still millions of dory and canoe fishermen in the world, who, like the dirt farmers, 

 can .scarcely feed their own families liy their effort.s, the big food producei'S 

 of the sea. are the skippers whose vessels cost half a million to a million and 

 a half apiece, who have modern electronic navigational and fish locating de- 

 vices, whose powerphmts are modern and efficient, and who can follow the fish 

 rather than wait for them to come to him. These are the men who produce in 

 volume at the cheapest cost per ton of product, and by doing .so lower man- 

 kind's food bill. 



