OVERFISHED OCEANS; THE PATH TOWARDS SELF-DESTRUCTION

This long-term project analyzes the human being-environmental relationship by exposing the path that follows the sustainable fishing communities which are capable of making a sustainable living without causing damages to the environment and the opposing path of ambition, which leads from sustainable fishing to commercial fishing, in which the main goal of the primitive fishing communities ,consisting in subsistence and survival, is traded by the ambitious greed for huge profits leading to commercial fishing. The initial primitive fishing community belongs to Cambodia, representing a sustainable community which focused themselves on survival or at the very most on the trade of their surplus fishing products for other goods. The following fishing community belongs to Vietnam, and although it was some years ago a traditional one, for the past years the abundance of fishing species rapidly changed it into a huge fishing location, becoming one of the main suppliers of the Vietnamese fishing markets. Their fishing is aimed for profits , and the capture of an extremely rare Banded Eagle Ray is only valued from the perspective of the substantial profits that it will bring. The sharks packed in boxes belong to a heavy industrialized and organized Taiwanese company, specialized in the fishing of large quantities , regardless of the capture of any possible endangered species. The last example already reveals the broken man-environmental relationship. A child attempts to eat a piece of crab which his father has captured in far away waters. Although initially this fishing village in the island of Koh Kong in Cambodia had a perfect environmental relationship, the whole village became totally careless about their surroundings. They never provided for any waste management or sewage systems, and they overfished their waters. Today and due to the climate change, this fishing village is slowly sinking below the waters .

My name is Javier Sanchez-Monge Escardo .I was born in Madrid in 1965.Education: Degree in International business management at the Schiller International University Germany (Heidleberg), 3 years of Biology studies at the University of Alcala de Henares and a degree in Philosophy, followed by a PHD still to be finished. Several advanced photography courses, video and editing. Can speak and write in different languages. Constantly I have been travelling around the world, photographing and living in foreign cultures.