Bottom Trawling – UPSC Prelims

Bottom Trawling:
  • Bottom trawling is a method of fishing that involves dragging heavy weighted nets across the sea floor, in an effort to catch fish.
  • It’s a favoured method by commercial fishing companies because of two reasons
    • They can catch large quantities of product in one go.
    • Helps in catching deep water species.
  • Implications:
    • When dragging the large, weighted nets across the seafloor, everything that happens to be in the way gets swept up in the net too.
    • This has an impact on the biodiversity of the ocean, and also means many species are being fished to the brink simply as a consequence of commercial activities, not as the target of them.
  • Issue:
    • Indian fishermen use mechanised boats with highly exploitative fishing nets unlike most of the poor fishermen in Sri Lankan coast who use traditional fishing methods.
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