If the potato crop failed (which God forbid) we could still buy them from abroad. If this other resource fails, we have lost it forever, and our own fault it will be. A national disgrace of major proportions, with the added shame that warnings have been given for long, by reputable authorities. And our people - our governments, if you like - don't do enough. All this in the midst of the reign of the Celtic Tiger myth. Recently a group of serious citizens, including some of our most distinguished public servants, have put their names to an appeal to save one of our most precious gifts - the Atlantic salmon. There has been a spectacular decline. Last year's catch was one-third of the average for the 1970s, commercial and recreational.
This group recently circulated a press release signed by Margaret Downes. Among the group are names also known to all: Orri Vigfusson, who has championed this bright gift for a long time, our senior public servant Kenneth Whitaker, and others. What they ask is simple. The only answer to the drastic fall in the number of wild Atlantic salmon is to allow adequate numbers of the fish to ascend our rivers to spawn. Up to now, the approach has more or less been to concentrate on sharing equitably a dwindling national resource. Not good enough. The obvious and fundamental solution is to have more salmon uninterrupted in their daring, exhausting return to their native rivers. The press release is stronger on some of the remedial measures that have to be taken to achieve this end. First, perhaps, the interception of the salmon in the sea by drift netting and draft netting should be reduced, but preferably ended by Government intervention. Naturally the nets-men should be compensated financially. This has already happened in countries nearer to the salmon feeding grounds - Greenland, Iceland and the Faeroes - not by prohibition but by a quota system.
Best of all would be the total phasing out of this entrapment en route of the salmon. And the group points out that if Ireland could end the system (with compensation), other EU countries would indirectly benefit and perhaps EU funds could be available as a contribution. Anglers and fishery owners could reasonably be expected to do their bit. All nets-men, it points out, would have to retire at the same time, for obvious reasons. Time for the Government to do something decisive and quick. We don't need a tribunal.