Push For Increase Tuna Quotas At Bali Meetingff

Source: Port Lincoln Times

A tuna meeting in Bali next month will see stock levels assessed and the local industry continuing to push for a return of quota levels lost in 2009.

Southern bluefin tuna industry association chief executive officer Brian Jeffriess said the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT) meeting will also use a new approach to analyzing tuna stock called Management Procedure (MP).

The new strategy will use data from Japan’s longline catch rate on the High Seas and New Zealand along with data from the CSIRO aerial survey of the Great Australian Bight.

“The scientific meeting will also produce the traditional stock assessment and compare it with historical results,” Mr. Jeffriess said.

“I think everyone agrees that the assessment using the new data will show the stock is much stronger than previously calculated.  Only the full analysis will show how much stronger, and what it means for future quota levels.”

The industry will have to wait until October to find out if its bid to have quota levels returned is successful.

“The meeting in October is expected to fix the quota levels for the next three to four years,” Mr. Jeffriess said.

“The industry is optimistic that the scientific data will show that the quota lost in 2009 can now be returned to Australia.”

Next year’s catch is looking to be as healthy as this year’s, with the number of juvenile tuna spotted over the summer remaining the highest level in decades.

“All this should be celebrated,” Mr. Jeffriess said.

“Finally the industry can focus totally on growing the best product, rather than on the politics of an internationally harvested fish.”