Economics of Extinction; the Bluefin Tuna:
http://science.time.com/2013/01/11/the-pacific-bluefin-tuna-is-almost-gone/
It wasn’t an easy number to find. Earlier this week the International Scientific Committee for Tuna and Tuna-like Species in the North Pacific Ocean—seriously, that’s the name—released the latest assessment (PDF) of the Pacific bluefin tuna population. The bluefin tuna is the tiger of the sea—in more ways than one. It’s a top of the food chain predator that can grow to over 1,000 lbs. and swim at speeds above 50 mph. In captivity—you can see them at the great Monterey Bay Aquarium in northern California—they shimmer like sports cars. Unfortunately for the tuna, they also happen to be delicious—the flesh of the bluefin tuna is prized by sushi chefs in the high-end restaurants of Japan. Just last week, a 489-lb. bluefin was sold at a fish auction in Tokyo for a record $1.76 million—or about $3,600 per pound.
So it’s not surprising that the Pacific bluefin tuna—as well as its cousins in the Atlantic—are the subject of single-minded hunts by fishermen wherever they are found. But it’s always been difficult to determine just how rapidly the bluefin is being fished out—in part, possibly, because countries like Japan that do most of the fishing and most of the consumption of bluefin don’t really want those numbers made public. It’s a strategy that should be familiar from a lot of environmental policy battles.
But back to that scientific report. Buried deep in the highly technical language of the Pacific Bluefin Tuna Stock Assessment is a number: 0.036. That’s the depletion ratio for one of the computer simulation runs done that tries to model the effect of fishing on the bluefin tuna population. By itself, 0.036 doesn’t seem to mean much—unless you do some more math. In the simulations, the number 1 represents the estimated population of the bluefin tuna before we started fishing. 0.036 is what’s left now. Convert that to a percentage, and you get 96.4%. Which means that by the best guesses of scientists, the Pacific bluefin tuna population has declined by 96.4% since we began fishing it decades ago. 96.4%. No wonder that bluefin sold in Tokyo was so valuable. There may not be many fish left in the sea.
Mackarel fish stocks mismanagement:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/22/fishy-tale-of-mackerel-mismanagement
It was ironic that I got the call that the Marine Conservation Society , had downgraded mackerel from its “eat with a happy heart” list, to “eat with caution”, as I was putting a tin of mackerel into my shopping basket. Just last week, we were told that mackerel was plentiful and good for us. But, although this is news that hits and confuses consumers now, it’s actually a story that started some years before.
First, let me tell you that the mackerel in question is from north-east Atlantic stocks (an area from Gibraltar to Russia). It is not endangered. Not yet. The scientists at the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) are the ones that look at fish stocks and make recommendations as to what are the limits of any fish caught . This limit changes every year, is decided in December and becomes part of the common fisheries policy (CFP) which governs EU fisheries. These fishing quotas are reported in the press but most consumers quite understandably glaze over them. But if you had read the reports, you’d have seen that something was going on with mackerel.
What the ICES has said about mackerel is that its spawning stock biomass is currently at about 2.7 million tonnes. The safe biological figure is 2.3 million tonnes and it’s not expected to fall below that figure at “current exploitation levels” until 2014; but that’s only next year – hence why fish conservation organisations are concerned now. So the spawning biomass is currently above the levels required for a healthy stock, but, it’s declining and there is a downward trend.
It’s a sad story. Until recently mackerel fishing was well managed. The EU and Norway (which has allied itself closely with the EU in fishery terms) had a 90% quota of the total mackerel quota; the remaining 10% went to Iceland and the Faroe Islands. Until 2008, there were almost no catches reported in the Icelandic and Faroese waters, because there just weren’t that many mackerel in the water to catch. But, in recent years, the mackerel have started to migrate, due to a myriad of factors such as rising sea temperature and to chase their food. These other coastal states wanted more than their 10%. In 2010 they started to increase their catches from 20% to 32% of the total allowed. Since 2009, Iceland and the Faroe Islands have unilaterally agreed their own quotas, which they are legally allowed to do as they are not governed by the common fisheries policy. Their own quota is about 150,000 tonnes over and above the recommended limits.
So you see, there is currently no international agreement which governs mackerel fishing limits, although there is hope of one this year. Understandably, EU fisherman are pissed off and everyone is confused.
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Tragedy of the groundwater commons (Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2278040/Nasa-warn-freshwater-shortages-Middle-East-study-shows-diminished-reserves.html
Vast freshwater reserves nearly equivalent in size to the Dead Sea have been lost in the Middle East in the last decade, according to a new Nasa study. Scientists warn there could be severe water shortages in decades to come if water resources are not managed better in the region. They say the precious water stocks have gone because of poor water management, increased demands for groundwater, and a major drought in 2007.
The study, which will be published later this week, examined 2003 to 2010 data from two gravity-measuring satellites which are part of Nasa’s Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE). Scientists used GRACE satellites rather than ground-based research because of the difficulty of obtaining data on the ground in the regions covered. The satellites showed that freshwater reserves in parts of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran in the Tigris and Euphrates river basins had decreased by 117m acre feet, or 144 cubic kilometres over seven years.
‘GRACE data show an alarming rate of decrease in total water storage in the Tigris and Euphrates river basins, which currently have the second fastest rate of groundwater storage loss on earth after India,’ said Jay Famiglietti, principle investigator of the study. He added: ‘Meanwhile, demand for freshwater continues to rise, and the region does not coordinate its water management because of different interpretations of international laws.’ About 60 per cent of the water went as a result of pumping underground reservoirs for ground water, including 1,000 wells in Iraq, and another 20 per cent was due to impacts of the drought including declining snow packs and soil drying up.
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Some insight into the 1.6e9 bullets the US alphabet agencies want to acquire
http://news.yahoo.com/homeland-security-cache-bullets-190840538.html
WASHINGTON (AP) — Online rumors about a big government munitions purchase are true, sort of.
The Homeland Security Department wants to buy more than 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition in the next four or five years. It says it needs them — roughly the equivalent of five bullets for every person in the United States — for law enforcement agents in training and on duty.
Published federal notices about the ammo buy have agitated conspiracy theorists since the fall. That’s when conservative radio host Alex Jones spoke of an “arms race against the American people” and said the government was “gearing up for total collapse, they’re gearing up for huge wars.”
The government’s explanation is much less sinister.
Federal solicitations to buy the bullets are known as “strategic sourcing contracts,” which help the government get a low price for a big purchase, says Peggy Dixon, spokeswoman for the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Glynco, Ga . The training center and others like it run by the Homeland Security Department use as many as 15 million rounds every year, mostly on shooting ranges and in training exercises.
Dixon said one of the contracts would allow Homeland Security to buy up to 750 million rounds of ammunition over the next five years for its training facilities. The rounds are used for basic and advanced law enforcement training for federal law enforcement agencies under the department’s umbrella. The facilities also offer firearms training to tens of thousands of federal law enforcement officers. More than 90 federal agencies and70,000 agents and officers used the department’s training center last year.
The rest of the 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition would be purchased by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the federal government’s second largest criminal investigative agency.
ICE’s ammunition requests in the last year included:
—450 million rounds of .40-caliber duty ammunition
—40 million rounds of rifle ammunition a year for as many as five years, for a total bullet-buy of 200 million rounds
—176,000 rifle rounds on a separate contract
—25,000 blank rounds
The Homeland Security ammo buy is not the first time the government’s bullets purchases have sparked concerns on the Internet. The same thing happened last year when the Social Security Administration posted a notice that it was buying 174,000 hollow point bullets.
Jonathan L. Lasher, the agency’s assistant inspector general for external relations, said those bullets were for the Social Security inspector general’s office, which has about 295 agents who investigate Social Security fraud and other crimes.
Jones the talk-show host did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Of course he (Alex Jones) didn’t. Asking him to critically asses his claims in the face of un-sinister evidence, while he is not in talk show rant mode, would let the gas out of the proverbial bag.
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A real-life analogy of the social conditions in the USA:
George Costanza would have enjoyed sailing on the Carnival Triumph as passengers were left to piss in showers and shit in red plastic bags for days. It finally became socially acceptable to pee in the shower. Most of the ship’s electrical power went down after the engine room fire, causing extensive breakdowns of vital shipboard mechanical systems, including taking out sanitary systems. Passengers reported sewage sloshing around in hallways, flooded rooms and trouble getting enough to eat. Passengers waited in line for three hours to get a lousy hot dog. On the lower decks sewage came up through the shower drain, pooling in the sinks and flowing into the hallways. The allegory of the poor people on the lower decks being inundated with feces and living in wretched conditions, while the rich people living in luxury on the upper decks are blissfully ignorant of the fate of their fellow passengers is so easy to apply to our society in this day and age. The 1% glory in their stock market gains, while 20% of U.S. households are on food stamps.
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After reading a number of articles describing what happened before, during and after the engine fire aboard the Carnival Triumph, the parallels between this Ship of Horrors and our Ship of State become self-evident. You have the CEO and top executives of Carnival only concerned about their wealth, power and control of the company. Rather than thinking long term and making decisions that might be detrimental to their short term quarterly earnings, but insure the long –term financial health and reputation of the company, their decision was driven by their true masters on Wall Street. Instead of taking the ship off-line to make vital repairs and necessary investments, they just papered over signs of an imminent disaster and turned to public relations spin and propaganda as there preferred course of action. When disaster “suddenly” struck, the management and executive officers were unprepared, slow to react, and more concerned with their reputations than about the health, safety and welfare of the passengers. Much more could have been done to alleviate the misery of the 3,400 passengers.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-02-18/guest-post-adrift-sea
What will you do the day you are forced to endure conditions such as these, if you aren’t already? Cry to the politicians? They can give you little that they haven’t taken from you already. And that’s even if they were listening to you. Mostly, they listen to the lobbyists of various, well-endowed SIGs (Special Interest Groups).
The crisis isn’t over. It’ll get worse, and in 10 years you’ll look back at these years as the start of the crash, for various reasons.
Prepare now, at least mentally.
