A conversation about deadly mesh nets, crazy quotas, species falling off a cliff and daring solutions. As global fish stocks plummet and great marine shoals thin into scattered traces, the value of what remains is rising sharply. It’s a textbook example of scarcity economics: the fewer fish there are, the more lucrative the hunt becomes.
But this isn’t just a matter of money, it’s a race against collapse of a vital food source. From coastal villages to industrial factory ships, the scramble to extract what’s left has become frenzied, often heedless of legality or long-term sustainability. And South Africa’s fisheries, once among the world’s richest, are being stripped – by greed, neglect, an invasion of silent foreign boats and the erosion of political and scientific oversight.
Mark Wiley is one of the few remaining South Africans with deep institutional memory of the country’s fishing sector – its policy history, its systemic failures and the political intricacies that have led to the present crisis. A former politician with the DA, Wiley’s interest in fishing is not simply bureaucratic, it’s personal. His father, a long-serving parliamentarian and former minister of environmental affairs, was a fierce advocate for sustainable fishing, helping to establish marine reserves and ban destructive netting practices in False Bay.
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From growing up immersed in the fishing communities of the South Peninsula to serving on maritime and environmental committees after South Africa’s transition to democracy, Wiley has lived through and helped shape the evolution of fisheries policy. Though retired from public office since 2019, he has kept detailed archives and a keen eye on the slow-motion decline unfolding in South African waters. His insights are both a warning and a call to action.
The history is clear. The science is available. The collapse is avoidable – but only if we treat the sea not as an infinite gift, but as a fragile inheritance.
If we fail, we will not only run out of fish. We will run out of the time window for their recovery. It goes back thousands of years.
Coastal foragers built tidal traps with stone berms – basic but clever systems where fish would be swept in at high tide and trapped when the tide receded. You’ll still find these along the Western Cape coast. The presence of these early humans can still be seen in shellfish middens – heaps of discarded mollusc shells that show just how central marine food was to early diets.
When colonisation began, the Dutch and later the British recognised the commercial potential of South African waters. Fishing villages formed – Kalk Bay being one of the first – with many residents of Filipino and Khoi descent. These communities became the backbone of local fishing, particularly line-fishing and trap-netting.
The early nets had large mesh, which was critical: they allowed fingerlings to escape and breed. Today’s nets are a different story.
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