Greenpeace confronts world’s biggest Tuna Vessel in Pacific Waters

The Greenpeace ship Esperanza has been following the Spanish super super seiner for the past five days (2). The Albatun Tres was first located in international waters north of Kiribati. The Esperenza has followed the purse seiner over 1,000 nautical miles and most likely prevented it from fishing during that time.

The Albatun Tres can net more than 3,000 tonnes of tuna in a single fishing trip. “The Albatun Tres arrived to the Pacific from the Indian Ocean earlier this year. The Pacific tuna stocks are in decline and there is not enough fish in the sea to fill the holds of these huge vessels,” said Lagi Toribau Greenpeace Australia Pacific Oceans Campaigner on board the Esperanza.

The Spanish owners of the vessel are looking at bringing even more vessels to fish in the region. The Albatun Tres is owned by Albacora, a large Spanish tuna company that is part of OPAGAC, a powerful association of Spanish tuna boat owners, processors and traders.

According to Greenpeace the super seiners of OPAGAC have a questionable history in the region. Some of the vessels now represented by OPAGAC were caught pirate fishing in the region last year (3). Nine Latin American flagged OPAGAC vessels have now entered the region under private agreements with Kiribati. As these Latin American countries are not members of the Tuna Commission (4), Kiritbati was granted a special exemption by the Commission last year to allow their entry.

”Greenpeace has evidence to show that OPAGAC is approaching Pacific island countries to try and get more licenses in complete breach of the spirit of the specific exemption granted by the Tuna Commission last year”, said Toribau.

Greenpeace is urging all Pacific Island countries not to get fooled into shameful business agreements with OPAGAC. Vessels this size needs to be taken off the water and scrapped immediately. Greenpeace advocates the creation of a network of marine reserves, protecting 40 per cent of the world's oceans, with strictly regulated fishing in all other areas as the long term solution to overfishing and the recovery of our over-exploited oceans.