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I. INTRODUCTION
Every year an area of the ocean floor twice the size of the United States is decimated by trawling, a fishing practice whereby powerful vessels drag enormous nets on heavy metal frames. Modern technology has enabled trawlers to operate in the deep sea where bottom trawling has become the greatest threat to deep sea ecology. Covering more than half of the earth's surface, the deep sea supports millions of terrestrial and aquatic organisms. As a result, it assists breeding and feeding of organisms in shallower waters that support marine fisheries worldwide. The deep sea also contains biologically rich submerged mountains called seamounts that serve as an oasis of biological productivity in the open ocean. Bottom trawling scrapes these seamounts and other deep sea structures clean, easily devastating entire ecosystems.
Recently, the United Nations declined to adopt a global moratorium to prohibit deep sea bottom trawling. Though advocates for the moratorium still urge the United Nations to consider the proposed resolution, they also seek alternate methods to terminate the bottom trawl fishery. One option is to restrict fishing methods through cooperative management agreements among neighboring countries. Though the effectiveness of such agreements is limited by the jurisdiction of the individual signatories, a cooperative management agreement, such as the emerging regional marine reserve in the tropical Pacific, could serve as a good trial ground for a moratorium on deep sea bottom trawling. The Eastern Tropical Pacific Seascape, a product of the cooperation and combined oceanic jurisdictions of Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, and Ecuador, encompasses an atypically large and biodiverse area of the deep sea. Banning deep sea bottom trawling in the Eastern Tropical Pacific Seascape will protect the vital environment and resources of that region while providing an unparalleled opportunity to illustrate the benefits of a moratorium for the global community. Accordingly, this note argues that such a ban in the Eastern Tropical Pacific Seascape should be adopted.
Section II of this note examines in depth the practice of bottom trawling and the importance of the deep sea, critically evaluating the ecological and environmental impacts of deep sea bottom trawling. In Section III, this note explains a past effort to curb the practice, the proposed international moratorium on deep sea bottom trawling. Section IV...