Indonesia's Solution to Illegal Fishing Boats Is Just to Blow Them Up

The South China Sea and its surrounding waters are the most hotly contested fishing grounds in the world, with China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Brunei all laying claim to parts of the region and the delicious seafood within. But while the competing nations are engaging in dangerous standoffs and fishing the Sea to collapse, nearby, around the Natuna Islands, Indonesia has developed a policy of dealing with illegal fishing that's having some unexpected benefits: by blowing up poachers' boats.

And it's working! They've put a dent in overfishing and rejuvenated their fisheries. Bloomberg reports that Indonesia's policy of destroying illegal fishing vessels is giving the fishing stocks within Indonesia's economic exclusivity zone (EEZ) the chance to rebound, according to Indonesia's Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Susi Pudjiastuti. In recent years, Indonesia's fishing haul has risen from 2.5 million tons to 6.6 million tons this year. Next year, the stock might even be sustainable, with Indonesian fishermen bringing in nearly 10 million tons of seafood.

Since the end of 2014, Indonesia has blasted 220 boats to the briny depths, making something of a show of the whole thing by dramatically blowing up the boats in public in various locations around the country.

"We catch them and we sink them," Pudjiastuti told Bloomberg. "If that fish is in my EEZ, that's mine. If that fish swims past the EEZ, that's anybody's."

Of course, nearby, in other parts of the South China Sea, not everyone agrees on the boundaries of economic exclusivity zones and fishing territories. China has asserted ownership over virtually all of the South China Sea with its controversial "nine-dash line," a supposed territorial claim drawn on a map in 1947.

However, China has not as aggressively pursued claims near the Natuna Islands, even as Indonesia has fired on Chinese fishing vessels that have strayed into its waters. Many of the vessels that have been captured and blasted to smithereens, Pudjiastuti said, are from Vietnam.

Indonesia's fishing operations are the second-largest in the region after China's, and Indonesia loses about $20 billion in fish to foreign fishermen every year. Presumably that number will fall as more and more illegal fishing vessels meet watery graves. Kablooie!