Global Fishing Meeting Ends in 'Failure' to Protect Tuna

At the conclusion Friday of the annual meeting of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WPFC), some of the 43 member nations said the meeting was a failure because a measure to introduce safeguards to prevent the overfishing of key tuna species was not passed.

Seventeen Pacific Island nations, along with conservation groups such as The Pew Charitable Trusts, were backing a movement to introduce measures to protect important tuna species such as bigeye and Pacific bluefin from overfishing.

Amanda Nickson, director of The Pew Charitable Trusts' global tuna conservation project, said the commission once again failed to act on scientific evidence of overfishing of certain tuna stocks.

"Despite more than a decade of scientific advice on the need to reduce fishing of bigeye, the commission failed to put adequate science-based conservation measures in place," Nickson said in a statement.

"Regional fisheries management organizations, including the WCPFC, were set up specifically to ensure that tuna populations are properly managed," she said. "The outcome of this annual meeting shows that some of the world's most powerful fishing countries are falling well short of their responsibility to sustainably manage tuna populations in the Pacific Ocean and prevent exhausting some of the last remaining healthy tuna populations on Earth."

Edward Honiwala, who represents the Solomon Islands in an eight-nation bloc that controls waters where more than half of the region's tuna are caught, told Radio New Zealand International that a bloc proposal to significantly reduce bigeye tuna catch limits was stymied by member nations who want unfettered access to fish the waters.

The meeting was not a total loss, however.

Member nations agreed to a total ban on the fishing of silky sharks in the WCPFC convention area, as well as to a requirement that all fishing vessels larger than 100 gross tons licensed to fish in convention area waters have unique International Maritime Organization, or IMO, numbers.

Luke Warwick, a shark policy specialist with Pew, said of the measure to ban fishing on silky sharks:

"Silky sharks are naturally vulnerable because, like many sharks, they grow slowly and produce few offspring," he said. "A stock assessment has shown that silky sharks are overfished and that overfishing of the species has been ongoing. The Commission still needs to set catch limits for all commercially exploited sharks, prohibit the retention of threatened species, and support national laws, such as sanctuaries, that offer greater prospect for population recovery."

The move to require unique IMO numbers on large vessels will play a role in curbing illegal fishing operations.

"Requiring these IMO numbers on all fishing vessels is a critical step forward in ending illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing in the Pacific," Nickson said. "It will now be much easier to identify who is doing what, where, and whether they are in compliance with WCPFC regulations."

Still, Nickson expressed dismay at the outcome of the week-lone meeting in Cairns, Australia.

"The big nations are the disappointing ones, given that they've refused to take cuts in their quota," she said, according to the Fishing Information Services news site.

"The week has been enormously frustrating. Although there has been progress on some measures, it's disappointing to see the commission fail on its core objective, which is to ensure sustainable fishing. The commission has been around for 10 years now and needs to front up to its responsibilities."