INFOFISH International 4/2016 ● www.infofish.org

34 Harvesting

IntroductionIn five or 10 years, it’s likely that tuna fisheries management will look very different than it does today. Currently, many tuna stocks are overfished, and the status quo is for fisheries managers to take corrective action only when a stock becomes overfished. Time and time again, these ad hoc recovery plans are decided in the heated last moments of a Regional Fisheries Management Organisation (RFMO) meeting, and not surprisingly, they are full of loopholes that limit their effectiveness. These decisions are political, and the science generally plays a supporting role rather than a starring one. Luckily, the tide is turning as the first proactive and precautionary management system was adopted by fisheries managers at the recent Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) Annual Session on 23 – 27 May, 2016.

The hope is that there will be significantly more tuna fisheries on a far more sustainable footing in the future, which will be met by increased consumer engagement and demand. And when we reflect on how we got to this position, the recent Annual Session of the IOTC, held on the small island of La Réunion in the middle of the Indian Ocean, will stand proud in the record books.

Accepted, this is high praise, but the adoption of a harvest control rule (HCR) for skipjack tuna – a stock that is currently at healthy levels – is truly a pivotal moment in tuna fisheries

management. The agreement takes the politics out of future decisions for this multi-billion dollar fishery, and puts the science and the status of the stock squarely in the driver’s seat of the management regime. While this concept, known as the Precautionary Approach to Fisheries Management, has been accepted as best-practice for more than a decade, the IOTC is the first tuna management body to operationalise it.

Going against the grain of conventional fisheries management is no easy task, and it took years of commitment plus a certain amount of political manoeuvring at the actual meeting to finally get a tuna HCR across the finish line. The Government of the Maldives, in close collaboration with the International Pole & Line Foundation (IPNLF), spent many long months preparing for the meeting. The multi-pronged effort was executed on many levels, including shoring up the science, building awareness of other IOTC members, and reaching out to stakeholders to enhance the support base. A particular highlight was organising an Indian Ocean Coastal States Workshop for more than 50 fisheries officials and experts to discuss the importance of these critical management improvements and to align on an agreed proposal for the upcoming IOTC meeting. The Maldives took the input from this workshop to shape a broadly supported proposal, and further fined-tuned this with the help of experts in the field of fisheries science and management in the months leading up to the Annual Session.

A changing landscape for tuna sustainabilityby Adam Baske

The International Pole & Line Foundation (IPNLF) says the positive outcomes from this year’s Annual Session of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission represent a defining moment for tuna fisheries management. At this meeting, a Harvest Control Rules proposal for skipjack which was tabled by the Maldives, was met with overwhelming support.

Landing yellowfin by pole and line

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35Harvesting

Years in the makingThe process that has resulted in the skipjack harvest control rule began in 2012 when the IOTC formally implemented the Precautionary Approach. The Maldives was the primary proponent behind this progressive step to modernise the IOTC’s approach to fisheries management, including the identification of target levels of fishing and setting pre-agreed rules that would keep tuna populations from falling below dangerously low levels.

The following year, the Maldives started working with the IOTC and a range of experts to develop models of the skipjack fishery and evaluate different management strategies. During 2014 and 2015, the results of this work programme were reviewed and strengthened by various IOTC technical bodies, and in 2015 the Maldives put their first skipjack HCR proposal on the table for consideration at the Commission meeting. While it was not adopted the first time around, the IOTC asked the Maldives to further refine their proposal, and table an updated version in 2016.

It is widely accepted that the process of developing management procedures can be difficult and time consuming. For the Maldives in particular, there was growing frustration that no such measures were on the books to conserve and protect the region’s multi-billion dollar tuna fisheries while fishing for certain tuna species had spiked to meet the growing global demand. Then, in December 2015, scientists determined that Indian Ocean yellowfin tuna stocks were overfished and that other tuna species could go in that direction if immediate action was not taken.

This brought everything to a head. With stocks at risk, fishing communities throughout the Indian Ocean would also be

under threat – including many that IPNLF work with. In the Maldives, for instance, one-by-one tuna fisheries are a critical aspect of the culture, economy and diet. It is estimated that they account for some 30 000 livelihoods – 25% of the

working population – a vital contribution in a world with a growing population and ongoing poverty challenges.

The Maldives and other coastal states believed there was immense value in ensuring proactive measures were implemented as soon as possible. To that end, Dr Mohamed Shainee, Minister of Fisheries and Agriculture for the Maldives, invited all of the Indian Ocean developing coastal

states as well as leading experts from the fisheries and other stakeholders to work closer together in building the IOTC’s capabilities to define tuna harvest strategies. Indeed, in his opening address at the aforementioned Coastal States workshop, Minister Shainee emphasised the importance of having a harvest strategy formally adopted by the IOTC to ensure shared tuna stocks, which are critical to

economies, communities and cultures throughout the region, will continue to provide jobs, food and development opportunities for future generations.

As an international NGO, working to develop and demonstrate the value of one-by-one tuna fisheries to thriving coastal communities, IPNLF also believed the HCR would help safeguard the long-term sustainability of the vitally important Indian Ocean skipjack tuna fishery by implementing pre-defined management actions. Furthermore, along with its supply chain members, IPNLF also wanted to see holistic improvements made to the management of the Indian Ocean yellowfin tuna stock, including the science-based catch reductions, improved data collection, and strengthened controls.

Unprecedented engagementAs it transpired, the skipjack HCR proposal received a level of support not seen previously in Indian Ocean tuna fishery management. Coastal states and industry rallied round the proposal for skipjack, and the final version of the proposal tabled at the meeting had 14 coastal state co-sponsors. At the same time, market players, including large European retailers and suppliers, directly asked the European delegation to support action on skipjack, while other NGOs, including Pew, Greenpeace, MSC and WWF, all called for the IOTC to act.

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IPNLF

One-by-one caught tuna fishing is environmentally responsible, supports livelihoods, and allows fisheries to thrive

Delegates from Kenya and the Maldives at the IOTC meetings, La Réunion

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36 Harvesting

Adam Baske is Director for Policy & Outreach for International Pole & Line Foundation (IPNLF). His areas of specialisation are global tuna fisheries, international environmental policy bodies, and marine education.

The Maldives presented the skipjack Harvest Control Rule proposal at the IOTC plenary session, with 14 coastal state co-sponsors Despite an unprecedented level of engagement and coordi-nation, there was no guarantee that this critically important measure would be adopted, particularly as there were some major players that hadn’t given any indication as to whether they would support it or not. It therefore came as welcome news when the IOTC agreed to adopt the skipjack HCR on the second-to-last day of the 2016 Annual Session.

Unlike most tuna management measures taken at the inter-national level, this particular one is not intended to restrict or reduce current fishing. Since the skipjack population is cur-rently healthy, the measure simply outlines pre-agreed steps that will be taken should the fishery become unsustainable in the future. The main benefit is that should the stock start to drop, then its science-based management tools can be trig-gered much faster than by attempting to establish consensus at an RFMO level.

The HCR aims to keep the skipjack population at healthy levels, while ensuring the fishery itself is profitable and accessible to all. It is an example of best-practice fisheries management, which makes the Indian Ocean home to the only skipjack fishery with a RFMO-wide harvest control rule in place. The adoption of the HCR also sends a clear message to markets about the leadership role that the Maldives is playing in safeguarding Indian Ocean tuna resources into the future.

It is the opinion of IPNLF that the adoption of this measure paves the way for a new era in tuna fisheries management – offering a much more dynamic model for renewable resource management that safeguards the resource and the fishing communities that depend on it.

Special credit for the landmark decision should go to the Maldives, one of the smallest countries in the world, which spent years working with scientists, managers, and other stakeholders to establish the precautionary management framework for skipjack tuna.

Yellowfin management measure adopted With regards to the most pressing issue that faced the IOTC – the need to end overfishing of yellowfin tuna – delegates worked to the final hours of the Annual Session to agree on measures to reduce fishing effort and catches. Everyone’s labours resulted in the adoption of a measure that cuts fishing across major fishing gears (purse seine, gillnet, longline and pole-and-line), and aims to reduce catches of juvenile yellowfin by limiting drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs), placing restrictions on the use of supply vessels that assist purse seiners during fishing operations and by banning the use of lights to attract tuna.

It was decided that purse seiners will reduce their catches by 15% percent, dFADs will be reduced from 550 to 425 and the number of supply vessels will be limited, gillnetters will reduce catches by 10%, longliners also 10% and coastal non-artisanal fleets by 5%. Like many other reactive measures adopted by RFMOs to address overfishing, this measure is not perfect, and is unlikely to result in the level of catch reductions called for by scientists. The limits on dFADs continue to allow for significant increases in dFAD fishing, and actually put the companies that fish with fewer dFADs at a disadvantage.

While the IPNLF hoped for stronger cuts on both yellowfin catches and dFAD numbers, the fact that a yellowfin management measure was adopted was an encouraging step.

The catch reductions that were adopted primarily target the gears that have the biggest impact on the marine environment, notably drifting gillnets and purse seiners fishing around dFADs. The measure also attempts to balance the needs of developing coastal countries with the need for conservation, which is always a difficult trade-off.

Ultimately, the fishing pressure on yellowfin will be reduced, which demonstrates that the IOTC is a management body that can respond when stocks are in trouble. Importantly, the yellowfin measure calls for another stock assessment by the end of this year, which IPNLF hopes will incorporate a larger data set, including records from the Maldives. In all, the difficult negotiation on yellowfin further highlights the need to move towards pre-agreed HCRs for all tuna fisheries in the Indian Ocean and beyond. And thanks to the progressive stance and commitment from the Maldives, IPNLF is hopeful that this is exactly the direction that global tuna fisheries will go towards.

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