Thought fishing with dynamite was cruel and unsportsmanlike? Recently, a fisherman in Jiading District was fined 3000RMB for electrocuting fish, a method so cheap it makes using explosives seem like fishing blindfolded with a spork. Global Times reports:
The defendant, surnamed Xie, was accused of illegal fishing for his practice of using a modified battery to electrocute the fish in the water, according to a press release from the Jiading District People’s Prosecutor’s Office.
Electrocution is an effective, but wasteful means of catching fish, prosecutors said. The practice can kill a large number of fish at one time, but the majority of those fish end up sinking to the riverbed, where they rot and pollute the water. It can also leave surviving fish infertile.
Police and fishery officials caught Xie electrocuting fish on May 9. They confiscated 19 kilograms of fish.
Xie has been caught electrocuting fish out of season on several occasions since he began fishing this way in 2011, prosecutors said. Fishing regulations ban fishermen from electrocuting fish. Violators can be fined up to 50,000 yuan.
According to criminal law, one can be fined or sentenced up to three years in prison for fishing out of season.
From the perspective of a religious rod and reel fisherman, forcing this guy to shark dive without a cage and while wearing tuna-skin undies would be too light a punishment.
This isn’t the first time Shanghai fisherman have been guilty of using illegal means to catch fish. Fisherman around the Songjiang District are known to use both poisoning and electrocution to nab their quarry.
Chalk up another win for sustainable fishing/anything in China.
