Australia Helps New Pacific Tuna Commission On the Trackff

On the first day of the Forum Fisheries Committee meeting in Majuro in June, Forum Fisheries Agency Director Feleti Teo called on Pacific Island nations to increase political and financial support for numerous changes in FFA operations to allow island nations more benefits. When island fisheries ministers convened a few days later, they did just that, agreeing to both boost member contributions by more than 50 percent and institute regular meetings of fisheries ministers.

The ministers adopted the FFA’s revamped 15-year strategic plan, agreed in principle to annual increases in member dues-after nine years of no change-subject to approval of a new formula, and called for greater emphasis on fisheries in the “Pacific Plan” that is to go to Forum leaders in October in Papua New Guinea. The key element of the new strategic plan is the dual goal of effective management for sustainable fishing harvests and maximizing benefits to island members.

But while the new strategic plan, which includes a restructuring of FFA’s management, and increased funding is positioning the 26-year-old agency to confront rapid changes in fisheries in the region, its sister organization known as the Tuna Commission, is at a standstill.

“The Tuna Commission is a real chance to properly manage the last great fishery in the world,” Australian Fisheries Minister Senator Ian Macdonald told Pacific Magazine. “The fishery is OK now, but if we don't do anything, in 20 years it will be (devastated) like all the others.” But Macdonald, Teo and other fisheries officials expressed concern over delays in getting the new Tuna Commission staffed to begin implementing a treaty that went into effect late last year. Officially known as the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission, it is to regulate fishing on the high seas, working hand-in-glove with the FFA, which coordinates arrangements for fishing within the 200-mile exclusive economic zones.

While the Tuna Commission headquarters are now being built in Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia, the secretariat is yet to be organized-despite the momentum at the launching of the Tuna Commission last December in Pohnpei. In late May, nearly six months after he'd been selected by the initial 18-member nations to head the new Tuna Commission, Michael Lodge turned down the job.

Glenn Hurry, who heads the Australian fisheries department and is current chairman of the Tuna Commission, has been devoting some of his office's staff and resources to commission administration. “We’re fortunate that Glenn was elected chair,” said Teo. In June, Hurry was communicating with the 18 members to see if there is agreement to offer the post to Drew Wright of Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Program (SPREP), ranked second on the short list for the Tuna Commission job. Some concern has reportedly arisen over the possibility of choosing Wright because both he and Hurry are Australians. But Macdonald said in Majuro that if this is a concern, Hurry is prepared to step down immediately so the director can be appointed and Tuna Commission operations started.

Without unanimous agreement by all 18-member nations on offering the post to Wright, they will have to re-advertise the position-which will further delay the start of operations of the commission.

“The speediest would be to select Drew,” said Federated States of Micronesia’s fisheries chief Bernard Thoulag. Otherwise, they'll have to wait to the commission’s next meeting in December. “I hope we can resolve this reasonably quickly,” Macdonald said. “The Australian government is picking up the work. We don't want to, but it needs to be done.”

Tuna Commission problems aside, the FFC meeting in Majuro set the stage for a significant change in management of tuna fishing within the 200-mile zones to go into effect by the end of 2005. FFA members will shift from limiting the total number of purse seiners allowed to fish to setting a limit on the number of days that are allocated for fishing in the region to put more stringent limits on the huge, high-tech fishing vessels working the region.

After two years of preparation by island fisheries officials, the plan, known as the “vessel day scheme,” has already drawn criticism from Taiwan purse seine operators who favor a limit on the number of purse seiners, not fishing days.

A new generation of “super” purse seiners are now used by Asian and European fishermen that in addition to having much larger holds than older vessels, have sophisticated, high-tech tuna-tracking equipment that allows for much more efficient tuna fishing operations.

Like it or not, the foreign purse seine companies “will just have to deal with it,” Teo said. But, he added, “we’ve kept the distant water fishing nations informed of the scheme as it has developed over the past two years.”

Teo believes that the “vessel day scheme” will also boost the amount of money Pacific nations earn from foreign fishing companies by giving the islands greater control of their primary resource. An estimated $2 billion worth of tuna is fished out of the Pacific annually, but only a small fraction of that is netted by islands.

When the new regime goes into force, foreign fishing companies will have to negotiate with fishing nations to buy fishing days in each of the islands, a development that Teo believes will “enhance the bargaining power of FFA member nations.”