Overfishing: Oceans Are Dying
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| Fleet cuts, quotas the buzz at tuna meet |
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| Wednesday, 01 July 2009 20:18 | |||
But there is plenty of disagreement over what should be done about it. The European Commission thinks reducing fleets is the answer while environmentalists say tougher quotas would do the trick. The industry wants more attention paid to reducing bycatch, the unwanted fish, sharks, turtles and other marine life caught in nets, along with young tuna. The debate is playing out at a meeting here this week of five regional fisheries management organizations which are tasked primarily with protecting tuna populations worldwide. The groups representing 80 countries are meeting for the first time in two years to assess stocks of the fish and determine what more can be done to save the 23 tuna populations, nine of which are under threat. Stocks of the bluefin are now considered depleted in the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and in great parts of the Pacific. Skipjack, bigeye and the yellow fin tuna, meanwhile, are faring better but face risk from overfishing. Scientists, for example, recommended catch quotas of 15,000 tons a year for Mediterranean bluefin tuna. But the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas in November agreed to allow a quota of 22,000 tons per year and allow fishing during critical spawning months. The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission, meanwhile, agreed in December to cut catches of bigeye tuna by 10 percent in each of the next three years. That was far short of the immediate 30 percent cut demanded by environmentalists and some scientists. The EU is also pushing for progress on existing proposals to create a global registry of tuna boats so they can be monitored, and a common list — shared by all five regional commissions — of ships found to engage in illegal, unreported or unregulated fishing. Julio Moron, whose Spanish association represents eight companies with 34 vessels which catch some 250,000 tons a year, agreed fleets have to be reduced. "We have reached a ceiling of sustainability, all the stocks are suffering but vessel capacity is still growing," he added. (From google.com, San Sebastian, Spain, by Ciaran Giles) 
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It's no secret that overfishing has driven many tuna species including the iconic blue fin to the brink of extinction. 
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