Extinction-style aquaculture poorly regulated, functional departments fail to act

Pikou Town, Pulandian City, Dalian, Liaoning, is the largest area for sea cucumber farming in the waters around Dalian. Due to the large amounts of antibiotics and other drugs added by farmers, species in the coastal waters have been almost driven to extinction. Some fishermen said that in these waters, other organisms such as mullet and prawns have now been “wiped out at the root”. (Beijing Morning Post, September 10)

“Extinction-style farming” sounds like a self-contradictory concept, because farming means breeding, growth and development, while extinction means destruction, harm and ruin. But in the sea cucumber farming area in the waters around Dalian, Liaoning, “extinction-style farming” has surprisingly been “merged into one”: in order to farm sea cucumbers and obtain the greatest economic benefits, local farmers used large amounts of antibiotics and chemical preparations, pushing other marine and tidal flat organisms in the nearby waters to the brink of extinction.

A careful review of the antibacterial drugs and chemical preparations used by local farmers in the sea cucumber farming process can only be described as shocking. Quicklime, bleach, penicillin, ceftriaxone sodium, norfloxacin hydrochloride, Liukang Di'an, insecticides and others number more than ten kinds. Many of these antibacterial drugs are used in the treatment of human diseases, but these drugs that can save human health and lives are lethal poisons to most marine organisms. What is even more deadly is that some farmers, in order to prevent other marine organisms from competing with sea cucumbers for nutrients, deliberately release insecticides and other substances to “target-kill” other marine organisms. Thus, in the face of a flourishing local sea cucumber farming industry, the nearby waters have almost become a “dead sea” or a “marine desert”. There is a phrase, “drain the pond to catch all the fish”, and applying it to the local sea cucumber farming industry is truly most appropriate.

Leaving aside whether sea cucumbers forced to grow by the addition of various chemical solutions still have very high nutritional value, it is obvious that the existence of this “extinction-style farming” has dealt a devastating blow to the local marine ecosystem and terrestrial ecosystem. This not only does not conform to the concept of ecological environmental protection, but also does not conform to the requirements of sustainable economic development. It is entirely for satisfying the interests of a minority at the expense of the interests of the majority, equivalent to making the entire ecological environment pay for the prosperity of a minority.

What is worrying is that although the situation is showing an increasingly serious trend, no department has paid attention to it, let alone exercised effective supervision. As for whether the illegal use of various antibacterial drugs and chemical preparations in the aquaculture process falls under the supervision of the fisheries department, the environmental protection department or the agriculture department, it is still unknown, but what is certain is that since it involves suspected illegal use of antibacterial drugs and suspected pollution and destruction of the ecological environment, then a government functional department should certainly step forward to regulate, rectify and prohibit it, and carry out accountability and punishment according to law; otherwise, it is dereliction of duty and failure to act.