Coral Harvesting in Fiji- A Coral-List Thread

[Kalkbreath]

http://www.coral.noaa.gov/themes/fiji-harvest.html
I never get enough of this thread. How well it illustrates the importance knowing whos behind the gathering of data. And how one man can blow the lid off multi level conspiracies with a few simple taps of a calculator ........

 

[mkirda]

http://www.coral.noaa.gov/themes/fiji-harvest.html
I never get enough of this thread. How well it illustrates the importance knowing whos behind the gathering of data. And how one man can blow the lid off multi level conspiracies with a few simple taps of a calculator ........

I'd love to understand how anyone can understand anything from that thread.
First of all, it is six years old.
Second of all, you have a bunch of people referring to numbers, none of which are publicly available.
Third of all, several people claim that they will reveal all, but then it just ends without any revelation.

Citing this old thread as meaningful is... well... pretty meaningless.

It is six years later, the reefs are in worse shape, waiting for MAC to step in and fix things has proved fruitless, and nothing was accomplished.

Why do I not feeling like jumping up and down with joy?

Mike

 

[Kalkbreath]

Did someone replug in the record player?
Six years later ,still not one shred of any thing to back up your silly claims of how the hobby is denuding the oceans.
Your Speedo is too low and your agenda is showing again.
Fiji Government and CITES both looked into Eric's claims of how ninety percent of the FIJI corals were somehow sneaking in around US Fish and Wildlife and CITES.
The fact that even if every single air plane leaving Tonga was caring nothing but live coral, it still couldn't haul the amount of coral you all were claiming was being collected for the trade.... didn't seem to phase you at all

Not embarrassed, no apology ........nothing but on to the next trumped up scandal............

 

[mkirda]

Did someone replug in the record player?
Six years later ,still not one shred of any thing to back up your silly claims of how the hobby is denuding the oceans.
Your Speedo is too low and your agenda is showing again.
Fiji Government and CITES both looked into Eric's claims of how ninety percent of the FIJI corals were somehow sneaking in around US Fish and Wildlife and CITES.
The fact that even if every single air plane leaving Tonga was caring nothing but live coral, it still couldn't haul the amount of coral you all were claiming was being collected for the trade.... didn't seem to phase you at all

Not embarrassed, no apology ........nothing but on to the next trumped up scandal............

What would I possibly be embarrassed about?

Did you read the post?

From: Mike and Marelet Kirda <[email protected]>
To: Maureen Penjueli <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected] <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Coral Harvesting - Fiji.
Date: Friday, August 06, 1999 11:46 AM

At 10:33 AM 8/6/99 +0000, you wrote:
>Bula everyone,
>
>There is currently a huge debate in Fiji with regards to Coral
>harvesting in Fiji. A paper was commissioned by the Fisheries
>Department and the industry to address the issue.
>
>Recommendation is to allow the industry to go ahead and there is a
>lot of concern in the country about the potential damage to the
>country. However support is divided between those who support the
>industry and those that don't. Fiji is becoming one of the biggest
>exporters if not the biggest exporter of coral products and there is
>concern regarding the damage that is done to the natural environment
>which has not been adequately dealt with in the report.

Bula, Maureen.

I wanted to add my comments as an informed and concerned hobbyist. There is little doubt that coral collection *could* harm a reef if the collection pressure is high enough. The vast majority of corals coming into the US still seem to be those physically chipped off the reef, as Julian described. My feeling is that 'normal' collection pressure would likely influence species composition, though likely not overall biomass.

What is more disturbing, frankly, is the attitudes of the stores here in the US- As you likely already know, there are alternatives to the collection as outlined above. There is a 'farming' operation in the Solomon Islands where local women go collect some small fragments off the reef itself (i.e. the equivalent of storm damage) and bring them back to mount on small cement disks. These are then grown out in a local lagoon for 3 to 6 months and then harvested.

What is most amazing about these cultured colonies is that their rate of shipping death is amazingly low- typically well under 1%, assuming no delays in shipping. Compare that with chipped off colony corals- I think we are happy to see only a 10% loss, and they are often much higher: 40 to 80% is not that uncommon.

Yet even given the low rate of loss, most retailers will not carry cultured corals. They are 'too small' or 'too expensive': even though wholesale they are but a buck or two higher in cost...

Many of the more informed hobbyists have taken a course of 'no wild caught colonies, period'. My own tank has maybe three colonies- the others are all grown from fragments given to me by other hobbyists, either for cash or trade. However, we are but a few, and seem to have the entire industry against us.

I would love to see countries like Fiji get to the point where they limit wild coral collection to a few thousand colonies a year, or even shut it down completely, but encourage the creation of cultured coral 'farms' as an alternative. I think it would be in everyone's best interests. The US would be forced to import these ecologically sound alternatives, Fijian collectors could become farmers, and the 'industry' would still have access to corals. Everyone wins.

I do hope that this post was helpful to you.

Best regards.
Mike Kirda

Dare I point out that your avatar indicates that you are importing and selling these very same farmed colonies? My agenda is showing, and it is currently your livelihood, Kalk? How could you miss that?

That I would prefer that coastal communities set up their own farms and sell the farmed corals for export, in order to keep the money in the hands of the locals versus white entrepreneurs is not something I hide either. But that doesn't preclude anything, and besides, it would only foster 'my agenda', er, your livelihood.

Regards.
Mike Kirda

 

[Kalkbreath]

You got what you wished for. {six years ago} But has it damperred you anti industry stance?
Today over half the SPS coming in to the USA are cultured.
In Fiji the very coral farms you wished for and got ,ended up disproving the idea that our industry was responsible for a lack of coral growing on the Coral coast region in Fiji.
The farms themselved cant grow coral in this area. The water quality there no longer supports healthy coral growth.
By diverting attention to the MO industry instead of the real killers of those reefs [agriculture} Your movement enabled more habitat to be destroyed at a time it might have been possible save those reefs.
At a time when the Coral collectors were shouting for something to be done about the agriculture industry in Fiji.
The reeformers Jumped in ending any hope for the reefs.

 

[mkirda]

You got what you wished for. {six years ago} But has it damperred you anti industry stance?
Today over half the SPS coming in to the USA are cultured.
In Fiji the very coral farms you wished for and got ,ended up disproving the idea that our industry was responsible for a lack of coral growing on the Coral coast region in Fiji.
The farms themselved cant grow coral in this area. The water quality there no longer supports healthy coral growth.
By diverting attention to the MO industry instead of the real killers of those reefs [agriculture} Your movement enabled more habitat to be destroyed at a time it might have been possible save those reefs.
At a time when the Coral collectors were shouting for something to be done about the agriculture industry in Fiji.
The reeformers Jumped in ending any hope for the reefs.

My movement?
Interesting choice of words.

I find it invariably odd that my single post on Coralist constitutes 'a movement'.

The issue here has nothing to do with posts on Coralist.
Do you even know what the purpose of Coralist is, Kalk?
It is to facilitate reef scientists' communications.

There is a real, very, very real battle going on in the coral reef science world. On one side are reef scientists who see the potential positive good that keeping reef aquaria can be. On the other side, you have scientists who literally want the entire marine hobby shut down completely.

Believe me, I have seen the sheer animosity face to face. Share with a reef scientist (who is against the hobby) that you are a marine aquarist, you can see all sorts of emotions go across their face. Disgust is very common. But when you can go back at them and show that you know something - it really helps that you have read their work and can quote their research back to them, you can earn their somewhat grudging respect.

So go back and re-read my post, Kalk.

In it I acknowledge the issues with reef destruction and offer a solution.

What exactly in it do you object to?

You claim I am anti-industry.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
I don't want the industry to go away.
I want local people to benefit from it more, yes. But that isn't anti-industry.
I want industry to obey the laws of the country in which the animals are collected, and I want better handling of the animals throughout the supply chain. Is that anti-industry? It sounds like good business sense to me.

Seriously, go back and re-read it. I am going head to head with several folks who want the trade banned completely.

Do I find it ironic that Kalk would take my pro-industry post and twist it into a 'fact' that I am somehow singlehandedly responsible for taking out the reefs along the entire Coral Coast region of Viti Levu, all by a single post to Coralist? You betcha!

The local land use vs. reef use issue is unfortunately one that will be decided locally. Or maybe that is fortunately the case. I can't say.
If the LGU decides that farming is more important than the reef, and they are acting within the laws of the country, what can a hobbyist do?

I know what we face, and I have some inkling about what is required to reform reef degradation. Most of it has to do with water quality. Funny that a lot of it is similar to a tank environment. Stop the nutrient inputs. Add a method for nutrient export. Wait until the export uptakes the excess. Bring in appropriate animals, if necessary to bring down algae.
Let nature take its course. Obviously simplified, but there it is in broad strokes. Eliminate stressors and algae and the corals will come back.

Regards.
Mike Kirda