‘Protect tuna or face poverty’

As Samoa enjoys a long weekend and farewells the last of the Small Island Developing States (S.I.D.S) conference delegates, it is already gearing up to host another big meeting.

That is the 11th annual Tuna Commission meeting to be held in December, expected to bring more than 600 delegates to Samoa.

But the pressure for Pacific leaders as they head into that conference are far less collegial than the S.A.M.O.A Pathways that the global United Nations family has endorsed in Apia.

Draft conservation and management measures to protect tuna stocks are on the way – including one on Southern Albacore that has been stalling among Pacific fisheries and Tuna Commission negotiators for an incredible 16 years.

With bigeye tuna now an overfished species in the Pacific waters, protecting the biological health of Pacific tuna stocks must be a key goal for leaders if they want to keep enjoying the economic benefits from offshore fisheries.

That’s the message from New Zealand Ambassador promoting economic development in the region, Shane Jones.

“I’m a great one for closing the gulf between rhetoric and reality,” he said during a side-event at S.I.D.S conference, sharing fisheries lessons from three oceans.

“In the Pacific, if our leaders feel the fishery needs robust remedial action, then stop offering licenses. Reduce your catch (of tuna). If you don’t reduce effort, you can’t blame the distant fishing nations.”

Ambassador Jones chaired a session looking at how regions are maximising the value to Small Island Developing States from fisheries resources.

The session brought in speakers from across all S.I.D.S regions to share best practice and underline the importance of partnership to the sustainable development of the fisheries sector.

Panellists were Jean-Paul Adam, Foreign Minister of the Republic of the Seychelles, James Movick, Director General of the Pacific Islands

Forum Fisheries Agency and Milton Haughton, Executive Director of the Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism.

“Unless S.I.D.S are really vigilant about stewardship of the fisheries and enforcement of the rules around the fisheries, and constantly protect their rights as sovereign nations over the ownership of the resources, they are always going to play second fiddle to the interests of the fishing nations,” said Mr. Jones.

Ambassador Jones says he was pleased to see the profile given to Oceans and Fisheries in the side events of S.I.D.S, but noted more work for Pacific leaders is looming when they return to Samoa in a few months for the all-important Tuna

Commission, also known as the Western Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (W.C.P.F.C).

“I shudder when I think about how long that’s taken,” he said.

While noting this also happened with orange roughy measures in the New Zealand fishery, “if you let these things slip and slide for reasons that are murky, you’re on a long slow decline into poverty. The biological health of the fishery must come first.”

During the session proper, Mr. Movick pointed out the difficulties that Regional Fisheries Management Organisations like W.C.P.F.C have in managing areas beyond national jurisdiction. Pacific Island nations are able to conservatively manage their own E.E.Zs by applying zone based management under the rights given to all coastal States under international law, but for fishing on the high seas decision are made by consensus of the W.C.P.F.C membership, and that membership includes those interested in fishing shared stocks to the lowest possible level.

“It is clear from the results that the current system of high seas governance is fundamentally flawed. Until a more effective system of decision making is worked out, a solution that has been suggested by several FFA small island states is simply to impose a moratorium on high seas fishing”, Mr. Movick told the audience.

“As coastal states we have limited influence on the high seas but Pacific Island members of the P.N.A group have already said that they will not license any purse-seiners to fish in their zones if these boats also fish in the two high seas pockets in the west of our region.

“The entire F.F.A membership has agreed that they will not license any vessels that fish in the high seas pocket east of the Cook Islands.”

However, that still leaves these areas open to boats that don’t want to be licensed to fish in Pacific Island E.E.Zs. The decision to close these areas fully has to be taken either by the entire W.C.P.F.C membership, or by the entire international community.

“Another solution that has also been suggested by a few” he said, “would be to extend the national rule of law across these high seas pockets and eliminate these havens of IUU fishing entirely.”

He noted this is controversial, because only the countries adjacent to the pockets might be able to extend their jurisdictions, unless F.F.A members agree to share these areas equally between themselves and enable non-contiguous jurisdictions for those more distant from the pockets, like Samoa.

From other oceans, Jean-Paul Adam – Foreign Minister of Seychelles shared concern over issues around data and information where those his country negotiates with those who have far more data readily available. Lessons shared by

Milton Houghton from the Caribbean Ocean resonated strongly for the Pacific, while Niue Premier Toke Talagi summed it up when he put his comment to all during the discussion following the presentations.

“The model we’re talking about is about maximizing value from our resource, but we’re not the ones doing the fishing, yet the resource belongs to us….we get six percent of the value of fishing according to the World Bank. What happens to the 94 percent?”