A very irate e-mail dropped into Din l-Art Ħelwa’s inbox just recently. The sender expressed in no uncertain terms his disappointment with the content of a Din l-Art Ħelwa article published in the media in which the public was urged not to buy or consume unsustainable fish such as baby swordfish.

I promptly replied to the e-mail, explaining that there was some misunderstanding because Din l-Art Ħelwa stands firmly behind the traditional fisherman and sustainable fishing. I suggested a meeting to exchange ideas. Toni immediately agreed to meet me at his garage in Marsaxlokk a few days later and to know the rest of his family. Toni is not our fisherman’s real name for reasons that will become clear later on.

In his Marsaxlokk garage, Toni introduced me to his family: Salvu, his father, his mother, Carmena, brother Joseph and uncle Binu. Salvu showed me his lovingly maintained 13-metre luzzu, which has been in the family for three generations. The family has always fished exclusively for tuna and swordfish and all the expertise and know-how has been handed down from father to son for almost a century. There is also considerable financial investment in tackle that can only be used for tuna and swordfish fishing.

Salvu tells me about the difference between the traditional and the industrial fisherman. A traditional fisherman is a small-scale operator with a boat usually less than 20 metres in length and who fishes using sustainable methods like the long line. This method does not threaten species other than those targeted. The industrial tuna fisherman uses much bigger vessels, spotter planes and nets that are hundreds of kilometres long and catch all other species in their target area. The “unwanted” catch is discarded – dead – while even juvenile tuna are rounded up into pens for fattening and sale to the lucrative Japanese market.

The traditional fisherman can hope to land a few hundred kilos of tuna in a season. The industrial fisherman can net hundreds of tons of tuna in one trip.

Toni explains that tuna in the Mediterranean is in danger of extinction because of overfishing by the industry. This has resulted in internationally imposed quotas intended to control the allowed landed weight for each country. Each country then allocates its quota to the locally registered fishermen.

Malta’s total quota is less than 200 tons per year, to be allocated to the 90 traditional fishermen and Toni’s allocated share of the quota is less than 100 kilos – compared to previous years when catches used to be 10 times greater.

To put things in perspective, Malta’s tuna ranching capacity is in the region of 12,000 tons.

This year, Toni’s family members had already caught their full quota by mid-May but they still had another two months of the tuna open fishing season still to go. During this time, they are not allowed to land any more tuna on pain of fines and confiscations because they have already caught their full quota.

A possible solution could be for Toni to buy additional quotas from other fishermen, which would then enable him to carry on fishing but he has found out that international industrialists with access to the lucrative Japanese market can, and do, buy all the available quotas – even from other countries - because they can offer better prices than Toni.

The family needs to be fed and the luzzu’s running costs must be paid but the income from the tuna fishing does not stretch that far. The only other solution is to fish for swordfish.

However, here arises another serious abuse because all the big swordfish have been caught in illegal industrial drift nets many kilometres long: the notorious “walls of death”. Consequently, no big swordfish get caught by Toni and only the small swordfish that get through are captured.

That is Toni’s only way out to earn enough to survive and the main reason we are seeing so many baby swordfish for sale. Now, this is only putting off the inevitable because swordfish will be the next species to be internationally controlled because of the dwindling population – unless it disappears first.

There are two cooperatives that would be expected to support the fishermen but we learn from Uncle Binu that it is not as easy as one would think. Binu and others like him keep a low profile because they depend on the cooperatives for jobs and purchasing of bait, so there is no significant support from there.

The endgame is being played out as we read. Many fishermen are being forced by circumstances to sell their quotas to the industry and to avail themselves of EU subsidies to scrap their fishing boats. The days of the traditional wooden luzzu are numbered and no sane young man will choose to become a fisherman under these conditions.

As a Din l-Art Ħelwa volunteer working to save our marine environment, the day spent with Toni’s family has been most useful and I am grateful to them for the time they gave me to share the plight of the local traditional fisherman. What I have learnt motivates me to continue to work to save not just the great species of fish that provide us with precious food stock but, especially, the marvellous people and their ancient skills whose livelihoods are threatened because politicians do not act to protect those whose votes they need to stay in power where they can continue to fulfil some of the good they promise in their political manifestos.

Politicians can do much to save Toni, his family, his luzzu and the fish they need to continue to sustain traditional ways of Maltese life.

Din l-Art Ħelwa wants everybody to know the difference between the traditional fisherman and the industrial one. Finding the balance between both can be easily sorted if those in power work for the long term.

Following its successful Fished Out conference this spring, Din l-Art Ħelwa has suggested, and suggests again, that Malta can lead Europe as it has done in marine policies before, in particular now when the fate of the traditional fisherman is under threat.

We look to our Minister for Resources and Rural Affairs to take this opportunity to come forward with measures that will indeed ensure the correct balance is struck. Currently, short-term gain still tips the scales.

The author is secretary general of Din l-Art Ħelwa.