Pacific island states called for a 30% cut in tuna catches in
the South Pacific by China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and the United
States in order to save their fisheries.
The Pacific states, which include Australia, said the annual
Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) meeting in
Busan, South Korea, should back a plan to cut bigeye and yellowfin
tuna catches by a third over the next three years.
"As owners of the tuna resource, Pacific islands are committed to
cooperation through the WCPFC to manage big eye and yellowfin
tuna," said Theofanes Isamu, chair of the Pacific Islands Forum
Fisheries Agency.
"We are concerned that big eye tuna is subject to over fishing and
yellowfin tuna is fully exploited," Isamu said in a statement on
Monday.
Western and Central Pacific tuna stocks are the largest in the
world and account for more than half the tuna consumed.
The WCPFC meeting in Busan, December 7-12, is considering a plan by
its chairman to dramatically cut tuna catches in the Pacific, in
line with cuts in Atlantic and Mediterranean catches, and to
implement other measures to save the tuna species.
A decline in bluefin stocks has increased demand for the bigeye
tuna, which is fished in the Indian and Atlantic oceans and the
Western and Central Pacific.
Worldwide stocks of bigeye tuna, a prime source for Japanese
restaurants serving sushi and sashimi around the world, are on the
verge of collapse from overfishing, conservationists say.
Shorten fishing season
In November, the European Union and nations such as Russia,
Japan and South Korea that fish the Atlantic and Mediterranean, cut
bluefin tuna quotas by 30% to 19,950 tonnes in 2010.
The EU Commission said the agreement would shorten the fishing
season by four months, freeze fishing capacity at 2007-2008 levels
and help crack down on illegal fishing.
But environmental groups said the new limits were inadequate and
would not stop a sharp decline in the species.
The Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency represents 17 of the 32
nations in the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries
Commission.
Isamu said Pacific islands accounted for just $US 200 million worth
of tuna from their fisheries, while foreign nations fishing in the
same waters totalled over $US 1 billion.
"We need to use our tuna resources for employment, income and food
security and to increase our local profits from tuna to develop our
local economies," Isamu said.
The WCPFC will also consider banning long line fishing vessels from
throwing juvenile fish back to sea, stationing observers on all
tuna boats, close the high seas to tuna boats for three months a
year, and ban the use of fish-attracting ocean buoys and floats
inside island exclusive economic zones.
The Pacific states implemented such bans from June 15, 2008.
In February the island nation Kiribati created the world's
largest protected marine reserve, a California-sized watery
wilderness covering 410,500 square km, to preserve tuna spawning
grounds and coral reef biodiversity.
Environmental group Greenpeace said decades of over-exploitation
has reduced some Pacific tuna stocks to just 15% and European
fishing firms are now chasing tuna in the Pacific after tuna stocks
fell in the Atlantic.
Greenpeace Pacific activist Josua Turaganivalu said the lives and
economies of Pacific Islanders and nations are in peril as over
fishing depletes the two key tuna stocks.
"The game for global tuna stocks is not over yet. The WCPFC has a
last chance to ensure the bigeye and yellowfin tuna stocks do not
face the same fate as bluefin tuna, which is now endangered...,"
Turaganivalu said.
