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Spreading the word on Pacific actions for sustainable ocean fisheries management

Author: Jonas Cullwick

What happened, what’s next? Pacific nations at WCPFC13 achieve Observer safety, but Harvest strategy work looming

Categories @WCPFC13, FFA Media Fellows past eventsPosted on 20 December 2016
What happened, what’s next? Pacific nations at WCPFC13 achieve Observer safety, but Harvest strategy work looming
Talk must now turn to Target Reference Points and Harvest Stategy approaches for each of our key tuna species-- FFA's Wez Norris. (Photocredit: J.Cullwick)
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The 800 or so Pacific islanders who work as independent observers on tuna boats are some of the region’s unsung heroes.

They work alone as the eyes and ears of the Pacific’s monitoring and compliance efforts, alongside crews who may not want their activities made public. As a result observers risk harassment, intimidation and even murder.

Pacific nations made improving observer safety one of their top three priorities when they met with the fishing powers in Nadi next week at the 13th session of Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC).

“The observers are playing important but far more dangerous roles than they ever have before,” Wez Norris Deputy director general of the Forum Fisheries Agency told a group of Pacific editors gathered in Nadi to report on this year’s Commission meeting.

“Traditionally, observer programs are science based – they are there to collect information that gets fed to the scientists for their work.

“Observers are more and more being called upon now for compliance functions as well so the information that they record is used by fisheries compliance officers in investigations and prosecutions and so on,” said Mr Norris.

Their bigger role is exposing observers to increased threats.

“It exposes them to intimidation …it also exposes them to bribery and corruption issues,” Mr Norris said, “we need to take that very seriously as the information that they are collecting is absolutely essential, we rely on it very heavily.”

“We’ve been given very clear instruction by the Pacific Fisheries Ministers that these people need to be looked after. It’s a daunting job that they do and it’s very valuable to us.” Mr Norris said.

Wez Norris Deputy director general of the Forum Fisheries Agency speaking to group of Pacific editors

The issue came to a head in the WCPFC last year as a result of serious incidents including murder of two observers from Papua New Guinea.

“We have pushed through quite a bit of reform throughout the year,” Mr Norris said.

“If they get word from their observers that there’s a particular issue on a boat, they(have) a range of responses from simply liaising with the owner of the company and the master of the vessel, all the way to ordering vessels back into port immediately, disembarking observers, taking compliance action and so on,” Mr Norris explained.

“At the same time we see a very strong need for the Commission to have specific rules in place that require flag states and fishing companies to take specific actions.

“We want to make sure that we have as holistic a set of arrangements as possible.”

Both flag states and observer providers have responsibilities.

The FFA Deputy DG said that particular issues that they need to deal with include the issue of insurance and making sure that observers are adequately covered by the various forms of insurance – income protection, health insurance, life insurance and so on because it is dangerous working on fishing vessel and incidents do happen.

The two other highest priority areas in terms of the technical work at this commission meeting were not as well-supported as Observer Safety. They are harvest strategies and the bridging measures for tropical tuna and albacore.

Harvest strategies is basically a way of pre-agreeing management rules that the Commission would implement if a tuna stock got to a certain point or a fishery got to a certain  level. It’s the way of increasing the role of science in decision making for the Commission and decrease the opportunity of politicization of some of these decisions, Norris explained.

“For us the key ones of importance are: An Albacore target reference point. So, what the target reference point does is it sets out the target at which you’d like the fishery to be in. So, it really relates to the objective of your fishery, where you want it to be.

“FFA members put forward a proposal for an Albacore target reference point last year and it wasn’t successful for a couple of reasons. First of all because it is a new concept and these things get a little while to get people on board. Secondly, currently, the Albacore fishery is currently lower  than that target reference point, so it’s at a state that’s depleted lower than where actually want it to be.

“So, there’s a real fear among Commission members that once you adopt a target reference point then you also have to adopt catch and effort reduction to get back up to that target. That’s a real concern and a valid once.

“Our argument is that, adopting a target reference point is like making a statement of intent. It’s the Commission agreeing “this is where we want that fishery to be.”

He says one of the other components of a harvest strategy, important for the WCPFC13 was to record objectives for each one of the fisheries. This work, increasingly important as the Pacific heads to WCPFC14 in Manila, will focus on managing the three main fisheries in the Central and Western Pacific Tropical Purse Seine fishery. Operating mainly in the Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA) EEZs, managed under the vessel-day scheme; there is a tropical long line fishery, which is primary targeted at bigeye and yellow fin and that operates around the equator, and a sub-tropical long line fishery, which is primarily targeted at South Pacific Albacore.–ENDS

Author Jonas Cullwick

Pacific tuna commission 2016- focus on the shared goals to progress sustainable fisheries.

Categories @WCPFC13, FFA Media Fellows past eventsPosted on 6 December 2016
Pacific tuna commission 2016- focus on the shared goals to progress sustainable fisheries.
Ms Rhea Christian-Moss
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WCPFC13-2016 Chairperson Ms Rhea Christian-Moss

Pacific nations and global fishing powers meeting in Nadi, Fiji at the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission 13th regular session have been urged to get over their differences in the interests of conservation and sustainable management of tuna and other economically important marine species.

“There is an extreme divergence of Member interests, exacerbated by interest groups with entrenched and jealously guarded positions,” Feleti Teo executive director of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) told almost 600 guests and delegates attending the opening of this year’s annual meeting.

The WCPFC brings together all the nations that fish in the Western, Central and Pacific Ocean area,  and the resource-owning Pacific nations who have sovereign claim to most of it. Regional organisations, scientists, industry groups and NGOs including international environment organisations attend the Commission meeting as observers.

As well as the divergent interests, the Commission is charged with managing a fishery that is multi-stock, multi-species, multi-fisheries, multi-gear and multi-zoned.

“The scorecard in terms of how the Commission is discharging that responsibility is a mixed one,” Teo told delegates.

“Two of the key commercial tuna stocks, namely bigeye tuna and Pacific Bluefin tuna, are assessed by our own scientists to be in an overfished state and recovery management plans are urgently needed to restore those stocks to sustainable levels.

“I hope the Commission can find a way forward this week to lay the foundation for those recovery plans.

In her opening statement the Chair of the Commission, Ms. Rhea Moss-Christian, spoke of the need to “take small steps” to tackle challenges facing the Commission rather than no steps at all, which has sometimes been the case on important issues at past meetings.

“I understand how past disagreement on critical management action may have left some of you feeling discouraged.

“But a willingness to be more flexible and to find ways to move forward should be our mantra,” Ms Moss-Christian said

“In this context, I am asking you to commit to taking – at the very least – some small steps this year on the issues before us,” she added.

“Big leaps forward would obviously be great. But that’s a stretch in this forum. So let’s not diminish the value of incremental progress as a platform for reaching our goals,” she concluded.

The meeting was officially opened by Fiji’s Minister for Forests, Osea Naiqama, after a traditional Fijian welcome featuring a kava ceremony and presentation of an enormous roasted pig.

“We come from our various homelands representing our own people and I respect the need for members to uphold, or strengthen their respective national interests,” Mr Naiqama said.

“With this said, I acknowledge the fact that this will present us with certain tests this week.

“I view this as a ‘positive test of strength’ and with the firm belief that each member and distinguished representative is truly committed to working together to apply prudence and care to each of the important issues,” he added.

He said the ever-evolving modern world has given the Commission more tools to assist members in better understanding their work through this Commission.

“Technological, biological, economical, and sociological dimensions have evolved considerably in such ways that can help us better understand the surface as well as deeper aspects of the oceans and fisheries resources under our care,” he said.

There are many difficult issues to be tackled.

“With the ever-increasing impacts of climate change on our oceans and its fisheries resources, compounded by the pressures of Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated fishing activities, it is our collective duty, more so now than ever, to ensure that the Commission, begotten by us and for us, elevates the oceans and its species under our care to a state of sanctity once again, so that nothing of value may perish from the sea,” Mr Naiqama concluded.

Author By Jonas Cullwick

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