Why did the traditional fishing industry in the English Channel decline during the 20th century?

The traditional fishing industry in the English Channel experienced a significant decline during the 20th century due to three primary factors:

• Development of deep-sea fishing: The industry shifted toward large-scale, mechanized operations, such as factory trawlers, which prioritized distant-water resources over traditional coastal methods.12
• Exhaustion of resources: Decades of intensive fishing and the use of increasingly efficient gear led to the overexploitation of fish stocks, causing severe declines in populations of commercially valuable species.12
• Pollution: The advent of various pollution problems, including ocean pollution, further degraded the marine environment and threatened the health and biodiversity of the channel's fisheries.12

While these factors contributed to the decline of the traditional industry, coastal fishing remains an important activity in some areas, such as Brittany.2