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“Tuna fishing nations are responsible for placing bluefin tuna stocks on the edge of collapse, and rather than wasting time discussing compliance with an irrelevant measure they should now act to suspend fisheries until their management is based on science, fishing capacity is decreased to sustainable levels and marine reserves are established to protect breeding grounds," said Banu Dökmecibşı, Oceans Campaigner at Greenpeace Mediterranean.
Scientists have been ringing the alarm bell about bluefin tuna stock levels since 2006, and recommending a fishing cap of 15,000 tonnes to protect spawning grounds rampaged by industrial fleets every year. In 2007 the actual haul was estimated at 61,100 t, twice the agreed legal catch and over four times the recommended level to avoid the collapse of the population.
At the 16th Special Meeting of ICCAT in November 2008, the European Union brokered an agreement on a Total Allowable Catch of 22,000 t for eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean bluefin tuna fisheries in 2009 - which allows fishing 47% above the upper level recommended by scientists. ICCAT invited its members to make voluntary reductions on their allocated share.
In 2008, an independent review of ICCAT’s performance recommended the immediate suspension of the bluefin tuna fishery, as it came to the conclusion that its management in the Mediterranean is widely seen as an “international disgrace”.
Greenpeace advocates the creation of a network of no-take marine reserves, protecting 40 per cent of the world’s oceans, as the long term solution to the overfishing of tuna and other species, and the recovery of our overexploited oceans.
