Saving Seafood

First-of-its-kind crew welfare measure adopted at Pacific fisheries summit

December 11, 2024 — Working on fishing vessels has for centuries been one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. To this day, forced labor and other human rights abuses remain relatively common, with workers from low-income countries especially at risk. But new regulations in the Western Pacific Ocean could make it harder for ship operators to get away with abuses, and could catalyze change in other regions.

The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC), a multilateral body that sets fishing rules for an area that covers nearly 20% of Earth’s surface and produces half the world’s tuna catch, adopted a landmark crew welfare measure at its recent annual meeting, which took place in Fiji from Nov. 28 to Dec. 3. It’s the first binding labor rights measure adopted by any of the world’s 17 regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs).

The measure is a “step forward for human rights at sea,” Bubba Cook, a program manager at WWF-New Zealand who has advocated for the measure for years, told Mongabay.

“There is no question this is a … mast light for other RFMOs as we chart a course into the future,” Cook said at the meeting’s final plenary, according to a statement he shared with Mongabay. “With this important step, we have acknowledged the humanity of those crew working in challenging conditions around the world to bring seafood to our tables.”

On a personal level, Cook said the measure’s adoption was a “hugely emotional moment” that brought him to tears because a friend of his who disappeared while working in the fishing industry had advocated for human rights at sea and because of the positive impact he said he expects the new rules will have.

The annual meeting otherwise produced what NGO observers described as mixed results. The WCPFC parties adopted a voluntary measure to implement electronic monitoring of catches. This could help with data collection and rule enforcement, particularly on longliner fishing vessels, which have very low rates of catch monitoring by human observers in the Western Pacific.

However, the parties didn’t adopt another measure largely aimed at longliners: a tightening of rules meant to curb potentially dodgy ship-to-ship transfers known as transshipments. Nor did they adopt substantive new protections for sharks and seabirds, and they took no action to open up a key compliance meeting to NGO observers or improve governance more generally, drawing criticism from transparency advocates.

Read the full article at Mongabay

Critics push for more transparency at RFMOs that govern high seas fishing

January 31, 2024 — The organization responsible for managing the catch of more than half the world’s tuna holds a key section of its annual compliance meeting in secret. For three days, a committee of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) assesses how well member states are following fishing rules, without any outside observers present. The WCPFC says the meeting is closed for technical reasons, not to hide bad behavior. But critics contend this raises the possibility that countries with bad-acting vessels operating under their flag may avoid public scrutiny.

Regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) like the WCPFC, which manage fishing in international waters, or the “high seas,” should be accountable to everyone, according to environmental advocates who are making an increasingly vociferous case for RFMOs to become more transparent. RFMOs are, after all, in charge of shared public resources. Yet the public doesn’t always get a seat at the table: many RFMOs block access to journalists and even to NGO observers during sensitive meetings.

When observers are allowed in to RFMO meetings, they’re sometimes restricted in what they can say publicly, especially in real time, as decisions are being made. RFMOs issue reports after meetings, but few explain how parties voted or what positions they took during negotiations.

“When an RFMO puts out a report, it doesn’t say, ‘Country X torpedoed this proposal,’” Ryan Orgera, global director of Accountability.Fish, a Virginia-based advocacy group, told Mongabay. “It simply says, ‘consensus was not reached.’”

The lack of detailed information makes it difficult for reformers to hold countries accountable when they fall short of their environmental commitments: There’s no public pressure because the public doesn’t know where to direct it.

Reformers such as Orgera argue that increased transparency would help RFMOs reach their stated objective: broadly, to manage and conserve fish stocks in the high seas and “straddling” stocks that migrate between the high seas and countries’ exclusive economic zones, which extend 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) from shore.

Read the full article at Mongabay

Shark-fishing gear banned across much of Pacific in conservation ‘win’

December 10, 2022 — Industrial-scale fishers will no longer be able to use two types of shark-fishing gear in the western and central Pacific Ocean after the international body in charge of tuna fisheries there agreed to ban the devices.

The measure, adopted last week at the annual meeting of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC), is seen as a major and potentially precedent-setting win for conservationists who say urgent action is needed to stave off extinction for many shark populations. Shark numbers in the open ocean have plunged by an estimated 71% in the past half-century, with humans thought to kill 100 million of the animals each year.

“The science was on our side,” Kelly Kryc, the head of the U.S. delegation to the WCPFC, which co-proposed the measure with Canada, said in an interview after the meeting concluded. “By taking these steps, the conservation gains are quantifiable and measurable for vulnerable shark populations like oceanic whitetip and silky sharks.”

The first type of banned gear, shark lines, helps longline fishing vessels hook the ocean predators as opposed to other kinds of fish.

The second type, wire leaders, increases the likelihood of retaining a shark once it’s caught on the line. The animals’ sharp teeth can easily bite through a nylon or monofilament leader (a short segment of line attaching a hook to the main fishing line) as opposed to a leader reinforced with wire.

While the two devices were already outlawed in some countries’ territorial waters, last week’s decision marked the first time that one of the main bodies overseeing tuna fishing in international waters had outright banned their use. The decision may pave the way for other regional fisheries management organizations, or RFMOs, to do the same.

The WCPFC previously outlawed the simultaneous use of wire leaders and shark lines, but vessels could still deploy one or the other. A similar proposal to ban them was not adopted at last year’s meeting.

Read the full article at Mongabay

As shark numbers plummet, nations seek ban on devastatingly effective gear

November 28, 2022 — Famed undersea explorer Jacques Cousteau had a favorite shark: the oceanic whitetip, or Carcharhinus longimanus. He said they were the most dangerous of all sharks, more so than the great white (Carcharodon carcharias).

Some researchers believe the species used to be one of the world’s most abundant vertebrates longer than 6 feet (1.8 meters).

Today, however, the animal is one step away from extinction, pushed to the brink by overfishing.

While sharks are often pulled up accidentally by boats hunting other fish, especially tuna, many vessels target them intentionally, hoping to harvest their fins, meat, and, sometimes, their teeth and internal organs. Such vessels often make use of special tools known as wire leaders and shark lines, whose use is minimally regulated by the multilateral bodies that govern international fishing grounds.

Now, those devices may finally face a reckoning.

In a bid to save the oceanic whitetip, the U.S. and Canada have asked the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC), which governs tuna fisheries in those waters, to prohibit the use of wire leaders and shark lines.

The WCPFC could vote on the proposal at its annual meeting, to be held next week in Da Nang, Vietnam.

Read the full article at Mongabay

WCPFC to vote on skipjack harvest strategy, PNA wants it to be non-binding

October 28, 2022 — The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) will consider adopting a management procedure (MP) for skipjack tuna, but members of the Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA) are hesitant to commit to them.

The measure will be taken up at the WCPFC’s 19th regular session, taking place 27 November to 3 December in Da Nang, Vietnam. The PNA said its member-states want any MP proposals to be just an item taken into account when setting conservation and management measures, rather than a hard-and-fast rule.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Western Pacific Council Recommends New Approach for Pacific International Discussions

December 16, 2021 — Recent international Pacific tuna talks were deemed “unfavorable” for U.S. interests, according to fishery managers in Hawaii.

The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council had hoped to convince the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission to almost double the Hawai‘i longline fishery bigeye tuna catch limits. The Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee supported it and the Council had worked on the increase for the past six years.

The U.S. delegation also asked the Commission to reduce the total catch on South Pacific albacore, with a goal of increasing albacore catch rates for fisheries such as American Samoa.

But the Commission disagreed. It disagreed with all of the U.S.-recommended changes.

Read the full story at Seafood News

US Request For More Bigeye Tuna Denied By Pacific Commission

December 9, 2021 — A drive to increase Hawaii longliners’ bigeye tuna quota has again fallen short at the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission.

The U.S. delegation to the WCPFC requested that its longline bigeye quota be increased by 3,000 metric tons, noting stocks appeared to not be overfished and were not unhealthy, so could withstand an increase in fishing levels.

The proposed increase to the bigeye quota was made during the WCPFC’s 18th annual session, which ended on Tuesday, but the agreement failed to get across the line. Instead, the commission opted to keep the status quo for the next two years.

WCPFC’s negotiations dictate fishing throughout the Pacific, which is home to some of the most valuable global fishing stocks. The commission’s members represent 26 economies, ranging from Japan and China to Fiji and Indonesia.

The Hawaii-based Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council has supported raising U.S. catch limits for at least six years and was disappointed by the result, according to its executive director Kitty Simonds.

Read the full story at Honolulu Civil Beat

More Bigeye for Pacific Longliners? Scientists Say Yes, Along with Increased Monitoring

December 7, 2021 — U.S. fishery managers propose increasing its Pacific bigeye tuna annual catch limit and gets the Western Pacific Fishery management Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee’s blessing.

The SSC discussed issues related to bigeye tuna management last week at the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission meeting and endorsed the U.S. proposal to increase its bigeye tuna catch from 3,554 metric tons to 6,554 metric tons for the U.S. longline fishery. That endorsement includes an increase in minimum observer coverage for Western and Central Pacific longline fisheries from 5% to 10%.

WCPFC analyses demonstrate the Pacific bigeye tuna stock may sustainably withstand a modest increase in longline catch for the Hawai‘i-based fishery, noting it operates in a region of low levels of biomass depletion, the Council said in a press release.

Read the full story at Seafood News

Global Competition Over Fish Stocks Increasingly Affects Hawaii

August 2, 2021 — In the pre-dawn hours of Feb. 1, 2020, the Robin II, a Honolulu-based fishing longliner, was confronted by a larger Taiwanese-flagged vessel about 115 miles south of Hawaii.

The American-flagged Robin II’s owner Jino Lee said the Chi Win No. 1688, also a longliner, aggressively charged his boat as members of both crews argued and shouted in different languages.

The Robin II, which is captained by Lee’s father and has five crew members, is 62 feet long and weighs about 69 tons, while the Chi Win No. 1688 has 30 crew members, is 138.5 feet long and weighs about 327 tons, according to a Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission registry.

As the Robin II’s captain best understood it, the Taiwanese longliner’s crew seemed to believe the Honolulu-based vessel had cut their fishing line. Lee insists that wasn’t the case.

Robin II’s captain got on the radio and told Chi Win No. 1688 that he had called the Coast Guard. The Taiwanese vessel eventually backed off, but not before crew members dumped paint on the deck and sides of Robin II. Repairs cost the Lees more than $2,500.

The confrontation offers a window into the bitter — and sometimes violent — disputes that have gripped fisheries around the world and are coming closer to Hawaii’s shores.

The Coast Guard also said that last year it intercepted several foreign fishing vessels operating within Guam and Hawaii’s maritime borders, known as exclusive economic zones, for the first time since 2012.

Read the full story at the Honolulu Civil Beat

Western Pacific Scientists Recommend International Actions to End Striped Marlin Overfishing

March 22, 2021 — Scientists are proposing measures to ensure Pacific fisheries end overfishing of the North Pacific striped marlin population.

The Western Pacific Regional Fishery management Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee this week suggested several actions in order to satisfy the Magnuson-Stevens Act obligation both internationally via the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission and domestically.

Read the full story at Seafood News