When I was on the West Hawaii Fishery Council, I voiced an unpopular view: Any Hawaiian fish that could be captive bred on a commercial scale should be placed on the collection restriction list. Didn't happen then, and might have prevented future issues. Who knows.
The issues are caused by the fishing industry. This hobby is the scapegoat. Captive breeding isn't profitable enough for the fishing industry when people eat yellow tangs like tuna in Hawaii and the market for the aquarium hobby might be too small for them to justify it. Looking for a solution in a different place than the source of the problem isn't an effective approach IMO. I'm willing to bet the amount of wildlife exported for aquariums is negligible in comparison to what's consumed by locals. Regulating hand collecting by divers is sort of nonsensical when you consider the scale of things.
I don't even like yellow tangs. I prefer halibut.
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