To know, or not to know

The news is naturally dominated this week with the report that the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) -- not to be confused with the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) -- came out and warned the public that mackerel is “an overfished species” and that consumers should avoid it.

The Coastal Member States, including Norway, Ireland and the United Kingdom in particular, feel this is highly unfair, given the Icelandic and Faroese ongoing refusal to reduce their self-awarded huge chunk of the mackerel quota.

But, with a heavy sigh, we can see what has happened here yet again and how the international press love to "make hay" out of any crumb of anti-fishing industry news.

When the MSC certifies some fishery as being sustainably managed, it barely gets a line in a national newspaper or website -- but when a fishery is claimed to be no longer sustainable, for whatever reason, it makes headlines in every single mainstream paper, tabloid, regional press and burns through the...