A new film exploring the artisanal fishing trade for the home aquarium industry in Brazil has been released on Vimeo. Wild Caught: The Aquarium Fish Trade of the Amazon is the first full-length documentary to investigate the trade of tropical fish, the benefits it offers to rainforest conservation and the reasons why the industry in Brazil has been in decline. The film, by Don McConnell, examines the aquarium fishery trade in the Rio Negro region of Brazil. This wild capture fishery has existed for more than 60 years in the state of Amazonas and has demonstrated it can play an important role in the protection of one the Earth’s most important forest and aquatic ecosystems without depleting the populations of the fish. However, over the last 20 years, the industry has been in crisis and has faced numerous challenges. These challenges include the captive breeding of Amazon fish species internationally, concerns about fish mortality, pressure from animal rights groups, increased bureaucratic hurdles and bio-piracy. Each of these issues is examined in depth in this 90-minute film, which features interviews with the world’s leading scientists, researchers, exporters and importers as well as talking to the fishers themselves who describe their life…
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New film examines secrets of Amazonian aquatics trade
