The World Day for the End of Fishing (WoDEF) is an international campaign launched by

animal rights Animal rights is the philosophy according to which many or all sentient animals have moral worth that is independent of their utility for humans, and that their most basic interests—such as avoiding suffering—should be afforded the sa ...

activists that demand the end of

fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment, but may also be caught from stocked bodies of water such as ponds, canals, park wetlands and reservoirs. Fishing techniques inclu ...

practices. It takes place on the last Saturday of March every year. The campaign was born in Switzerland and France in 2016 and took an international turn in 2017. It was first launched by the association Pour L'Égalité Animale (PEA).

Events

Over the years and around the world lots of actions were organized for the WoDEF: street protests, sit-ins, screenings, conferences, fish counts, workshops, exhibitions, etc. in order to bring awareness to

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of li ...

pain,

sentience Sentience is the capacity to experience feelings and sensations. The word was first coined by philosophers in the 1630s for the concept of an ability to feel, derived from Latin '':wikt:sentientem, sentientem'' (a feeling), to distinguish it fro ...

and

fish intelligence Fish intelligence is the resultant of the process of acquiring, storing in memory, retrieving, combining, comparing, and using in new contexts information and conceptual skills" as it applies to fish. According to Culum Brown from Macquarie Univ ...

. In 2017, for its first edition, the event occurred in many cities around the world: in Lorient, Paris, Valence, Lyon, Lille, Montpellier, Saint Malo, Rennes (France), Geneva, Lausanne (Swiss), Brussels, Namur, Charleroi (Belgium), Montreal, Toronto (Canada), Stuttgart, Vogelsberg, Siegen, Hannover, Göttingen, Hamburg, Berlin (Germany), Lisbon (Portugal), Tel Aviv, Haifa (Israel), Melbourne (Australia), San Diego and Monterey Bay (United States). In 2018, for its second edition, the event occurred once again internationally: in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

Peru , image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg , image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg , other_symbol = Great Seal of the State , other_symbol_type = Seal (emblem), National seal , national_motto = "Fi ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark ...

, Mexico,

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

and

Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Cos ...

. In the same year, an open letter signed by dozens of philosophers and scientists, including Stevan Harnard,

Peter Singer Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian moral philosopher, currently the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He specialises in applied ethics and approaches ethical issues from a secular, ...

, Valéry Giroux, Sue Donaldson,

Will Kymlicka William Kymlicka (; born 1962) is a Canadian political philosopher best known for his work on multiculturalism and animal ethics. He is currently Professor of Philosophy and Canada Research Chair in Political Philosophy at Queen's University ...

and Élise Desaulniers, was published in ''Le Nouveau Magazine Littéraire'' in order to highlight the WoDEF. In 2019, for its third edition, activists from 269 Life France pierced their cheeks with fish hooks in a street protest for the WoDEF.

Demands

The organizers of the Word Day for the End of Fishing demand the abolition of all kinds of fishing practices for fish,

crustacean Crustaceans (Crustacea, ) form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such animals as decapods, seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, amphipods and mantis shrimp. The crustacean group ...

s and

cephalopod A cephalopod is any member of the molluscan class Cephalopoda (Greek plural , ; "head-feet") such as a squid, octopus, cuttlefish, or nautilus. These exclusively marine animals are characterized by bilateral body symmetry, a prominent head ...

s: the end of aquaculture, industrial or wild fishing, the use of marine animals as domestic pets, in scientific experiments and for entertainment, in antispeciesist perspective. Protesters affirm that fish can feel pain and that it is unnecessary to consume them.

References

{{Animal rights Annual events Animal rights movement Fishing and the environment International observances

Events

Demands

See also

References