The island nations such as Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, and six other Pacific nations have prohibited fishing boats from two areas of the Pacific Commons, stretches of international waters surrounded by coastal waters belonging to the countries. It is said that the ban has already effected to prevent destruction of bigeye and yellowfin tuna stocks and sustain an industry worth $3 billion a year in the Pacific. Conservationists said that the governments and fishing companies aren’t doing enough to prevent the decline of tuna stocks as they put the demands of the fishing industry and consumers above the sustainability of marine life.
Callum Roberts, a marine conservation biologist at the University of York in England, told that the balance of power between the fishing fleets and tuna has shifted too far in favor of the fleets. He also said that lower catches may tighten supplies in Japan, the main market for the region’s fish and the world’s largest for sashimi-grade tuna, where prices are rising due to depleted supply, rising fuel costs and competition from the U.S., European Union and China.
There is no denying fact that the soaring fuel costs has force nearly 30 percent of the world’s long-line tuna boats to suspend operations. It is said that about half the global tuna catch is from the Pacific, mostly from around the islands of the Federated States of Micronesia, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Tuvalu.
The states imposed the fishing ban after the Western & Central Pacific Fisheries Commission failed to strengthen conservation measures. It is informed that to enforce the ban, tuna vessels wanting licenses to fish in the countries’ exclusive economic zones, also rich in tuna stocks, will have to agree not to enter the protected areas.
