overfishing

English

overfishing

overfishing (usually uncountable, plural overfishings)

Fishing that reduces the stock of remaining fish in an area to below that which is acceptable.
- 1975, Northwest Mariculture Laws: Papers and Presentations..., page 22:
  Most of the overfishings in the international sense are a product of misuse.
- 2013 August 3, “Yesterday’s fuel”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:
  The dawn of the oil age was fairly recent. Although the stuff was used to waterproof boats in the Middle East 6,000 years ago, extracting it in earnest began only in 1859 after an oil strike in Pennsylvania. […] It was used to make kerosene, the main fuel for artificial lighting after overfishing led to a shortage of whale blubber. Other liquids produced in the refining process, too unstable or smoky for lamplight, were burned or dumped.

excessive fishing

Europe's seas are in a "serious state of decline" as a result of coastal development, overfishing and pollution from agriculture, warn scientists. (BBC news)