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In Sierra Leone Local Fishers and Foreign Trawlers Battle for Their Catch
{Sierra Leone Local Fishers – Earth and Leaf editorial} {extract below} In Sierra Leone, local fishers and foreign trawlers battle for their catch Overfishing isn’t a new problem in West Africa, where industrial fishing boats from across the world harvest massive quantities of seafood for both local and foreign markets. Many use ecologically destructive practices like bottom trawling, where vessels drag huge nets across the ocean floor, indiscriminately scooping up anything too big to escape and churning up corals, rocks and sediment. In Ghana, for example, a report by the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) last year found that fish populations are on the edge of collapse, with the total landing…