Media Release
4/10/99

GREENIES DROWN NZ'ERS IN A SEA OF MISINFORMATION.

The New Zealand Seafood Industry is disappointed that the Green Party has launched its conservation policy on a bed of characteristically extreme views.

Seafood Industry Council chairman Dave Sharp said the Green Party has announced it wants to lock up 20 percent of the current Exclusive Economic Zone to be used solely for Marine Reserves which means excluding recreational, customary and commercial harvesters.

"We are supportive of the concept of marine reserves for sensible scientific purposes but what the Green Party want is to lock up an area 8 times larger than the North Island as marine reserves."

"Mrs Fitzsimmons claims that international literature "suggests" that fishing harvests actually increase with the creation of marine reserves. The Greens have not supplied the public with any reputable research that backs up their assertions, and marine reserves are operated differently in other parts of the world," Mr Sharp said.

" We also would like to know how the Greens worked out that locking up twenty percent of New Zealand's Exclusive Economic Zone is necessary and what real benefits would be achieved. Again we would like to see the scientific evidence showing why 20 percent is such a magical figure."

"This policy is just another example of Mrs Fitzsimmons and her green activists using vague, unsourced and unscientific information in their drive to lock up natural resources rather than focus on sustainable use."

"Commerical fishers have instigated and do support marine reserve proposals in New Zealand but it must be remembered that the sole function of Marine Reserves is to provide for scientific study.

"New Zealand fisheries management regime, based on credible and robust science, provides for the sustainability of our fisheries resources. As a result the world looks to the New Zealand Seafood Industry for advice and support in managing marine resources."

"If Mrs Fitzsimmons was really committed to protecting the earth's marine environment, she should be promoting New Zealand's fisheries management regime to the international green lobby to ensure better global fisheries management rather than locking up large areas of the oceans."

ENDS

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