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It quickly became clear the Nian Sheng 3 was contributing to the overfishing of Pacific yellowfin and bigeye tuna and as well as sharks. A dozen sacks filled with hundreds of frozen shark fins and tails were packed in a large refrigerator onboard. Shark bycatch in tuna longline fisheries is decimating shark populations worldwide. About one million sharks are caught as bycatch in tuna fisheries in the Western and Central Pacific alone each year. Most have their fins and tails hacked off and dried for the Asian shark fin soup trade, while the shark is dumped – still alive - in the sea to die. As the Chinese middle class has grown so has the insatiable demand for shark fin soup.
Something Fishy
According to the Captain of the Nian Sheng 3, her crew had been fishing at sea for three months. A loophole exploited by tuna fishers in the Pacific allows the transfers of fish at sea to large motherships. This is used to confuse the origin and amount of fish caught. Taiwan’s huge tuna fleet operating in the Western and Central Pacific is contributing to the overcapacity of tuna vessels in the region. Last December, Taiwan and other Asian states blocked conservation measures advocated by Pacific Island countries to protect yellowfin and bigeye tuna from overfishing.
“Greenpeace escorted this Taiwanese longliner out of the international waters because the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) - which is supposed to be protecting tuna and sharks from overfishing - is failing to do so. If the Fisheries Commission is not going to do anything about securing the future of these great fish, then we will,” said Greenpeace Australia Pacific campaigner Lagi Toribau on board the Esperanza. Longlining is a fishing method used to catch tuna and other fish that is trailed behind large fishing vessels, and can be over 180 km long with over 20,000 baited hooks strung out along it. There are currently over 3600 registered longliners plundering the waters of the Western and Central Pacific Ocean.
After leaving the Nian Sheng 3, Greenpeace activists displayed a banner reading ‘Marine Reserves Now’ in front of the longliner and then the Esperanza escorted the vessel out of international waters.
Greenpeace’s solutions
Greenpeace is calling on the Australian Government to support the Pacific Island nations to make fishing in the region sustainable by turning the Pacific’s international waters into no-take marine reserves. This will allow tuna stocks and all other marine life to recover from overexploitation.
Greenpeace is also calling for a 50% reduction in fishing across all Pacific tuna fisheries to ensure there is tuna left to catch in the future.
Greenpeace advocates the creation of a network of marine reserves, protecting 40 per cent of the world's oceans, as the long-term solution to overfishing and the recovery of our overexploited oceans.
