Marcus,

This is a fascinating rationalization and I find it pretty
cynical.

As I understand it, without troubling to investigate
relevant Ecuadorian laws or, worse yet, having
investigated the law and having decided not to assume
any personal risk, you purchased shells from
Ecuadorian fishermen.  Although the shells came from
Galapagos (known worldwide to be a marine reserve)
you accepted them without question.  Nevertheless, you
say that you do not “encourage any of [your] suppliers
to go to parks or natural reserves to break laws.”  Later,
you “helped [the  fishermen] to buy engines to their
boats, fix car problems, and much more than the local
Government are willing to do,”  thereby making it easier
for them to continue breaking the law in your behalf.
You feel that you are justified because 1)  the fishermen
are poor [though in Ecuador, anyone who has a car,
boat, and/or outboard motor cannot be counted among
the very poor] and 2) because you “always stand up for
our rights of collecting shells whenever [you] can.”

In short, you do not consider yourself obliged to respect
local law or to respect internationally recognized marine
reserves if you can see an opportunity to take
advantage of the weak enforcement capacity of the local
government and profit from it.  If, as you claim you are
“in favor of selective shelling as it is made in Australia -
only those having permits are allowed to collect shells,”
then I think that you should see to it that your
“suppliers” have legitimate, up-to-date collecting and
export permits.  These permits are required to collect
anywhere in Ecuador, not just in Galapagos.

“Regarding Galapagos, the Government has a plan to
remove all families from those islands - so even the few
shells which became available will disappear from the
market.”  This is, quite simply, hogwash.  The
Ecuadorian government has no such plan; what it has
done is to restrict further migration to the islands in
order to preserve, as well as it can, the unique
terrestrial and marine flora and fauna of the National
Park and Marine Reserve.



--
Este mensaje ha sido analizado por MailScanner
en busca de virus y otros contenidos peligrosos,
y se considera que está limpio.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
[log in to unmask] - a forum for informal discussions on molluscs
To leave this list, click on the following web link:
http://listserv.uga.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=conch-l&A=1
Type your email address and name in the appropriate box and
click leave the list.
----------------------------------------------------------------------