Mauritania's depleted seas highlight need for fishing transparency

By Katie Nguyen LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Mauritania has some of West Africa's richest fishing waters yet overfishing by foreign trawlers means that hundreds of pirogues, or wooden canoes used by small-scale fishermen, must go further out to sea to net ever smaller catches. Fishing is an important part of the mostly desert country's economy, accounting for 7 percent of gross domestic product and providing about 40,000 jobs, according to the World Bank. Last week, Mauritania's ministe