Chinese owned longline yellowfin and bigeye tuna fishery in the Federated States of Micronesia has achieved Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certification for its bigeye tuna catch. This is the first time that bigeye has been certified to the MSC’s globally recognised standard for sustainable fishing.
Five stocks of tropical tuna caught by the Spanish tuna fleet, out of a total of 12, now meet the sustainability standards necessary to apply for MSC certification, specifically yellowfin, skipjack and bigeye in the Central-Western Pacific and yellowfin and skipjack in the Eastern Pacific.
Fish will fly when Australia’s seafood capital hosts its iconic Tunarama Festival this weekend, and the population of Port Lincoln more than doubles during the annual event with twenty thousand visitors heading to South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula for Tunarama.
A study by the Spanish tuna fleet in the Indian Ocean, three years after the introduction of its Code of Good Practice, integrated into its Fisheries Improvement Project (FIP), shows that the contribution of the purse seine gear to the mortality of main by-catch species is practically zero, compared to figures recorded for other gears such as longlines and drift nets. This study estimates levels of fishing mortality at 0.15%, for sharks and rays (Chondrichthyes), less than 0.3%, for turtles and zero for marine mammals.
French tuna company Saupiquet, part of the Bolton Group, has placed an order for a new 67 metre tuna purse seiner to be built at Piriou’s yard in Vietnam with a 2020 delivery date. The new vessel will become the latest addition to the series of eight 80-90 metre tuna vessels delivered by Piriou from both its Vietnam and Concarneau yards since 2010 for several tuna operators.
Thai Union Group has commissioned its €21 million Thai Union Marine Nutrients tuna oil refinery, located in Rostock, to produce highly refined tuna oil.
Nine days of intense discussion on Atlantic tunas at the ICCAT plenary meeting has resulted in disappointment with the failure to able to reach a consensus to revise the management plan for tropical tunas, in particular for bigeye tuna, which is considered to be overexploited by ICCAT’s scientific committee.
Spanish fishing company Echebastar has been awarded MSC certification for its Indian Ocean purse seine fishery for skipjack tuna. It hasn’t been an easy ride for the Bermeo-based company, which has seen its application go through a tough process that has seen objections at various stages.
Small-scale fishing organisation LIFE has welcomed the European Commission’s recognition that coastal artisanal fishing fleets should benefit from the reallocation of Bluefin tuna quota in a fair manner across all European fleets, and the proposal to reintegrate this marginalised sector into the Bluefin tuna fishery.
A multi-national operation co-ordinated by Europol and involving the Guardia Civil in Spain as well as French, Italian, Maltese and Portuguese authorities has resulted in 79 arrests and the seizure of more than 80 tonnes of illegal bluefin tuna as an illegal network handling an estimated 2500 tonnes each year has been dismantled.