"Transfers of fish at sea are well know to be facilitating
piratefishing around the world now we also have the proof of this
in thePacific. It is unacceptable that this is still allowed to
continue",said Greenpeace Australia Pacific campaigner Lagi Toribau
on board theEsperanza. "The pockets of international waters between
Pacific islandcountries are especially prone to pirate activities
and should beclosed down to all fishing. Transfers of fish should
only be allowed tohappen in port so they can be monitored
properly."
The Queen Evelyn 168 is not authorised to undertake any
fishingactivities in this part of the Pacific,. All vessels were
registered tothe Philippines. The Queen Evelyn 889 and the Kenken
888 have legalpermission to operate in this area. However,
Greenpeace is demandingthat tuna transfers happen only in port,
where the amount of the catchcan be accurately monitored. "At-sea
transfers result in massiveunderestimation of the Pacific tuna
catch. For years tuna havedisappeared unreported on motherships
like this. The Western andCentral Pacific Fisheries Commission -
which is supposed to protecttuna from overfishing - is clearly
failing to do so. The only hope forPacific tuna fisheries and the
tuna themselves is to close the PacificCommons to all fishing as
marine reserves and to ban all transfer offish at sea," said
Toribau.
Last week, a report was released (1) that estimates that on top
ofthe known fish catch, at least another 34% is stolen by pirates
in theWestern and Central Pacific.
Greenpeace activists were laterable to board the mothership with
the permission of the ship's Captainand documented the contents of
the hold predominantly of juvenileyellowfin and skipjack tuna.
Activists obtained information from theCaptain about six other
transfers of tuna he had done over the lastmonth in the same pocket
of international waters. These transfers aloneadded up to 675
tonnes of skipjack and yellowfin tuna onboard and weremainly from
boats flagged to the Philippines belonging to the samecompany, TPS
Marine Industries.
Greenpeace ship, Esperanza, is in the Pacific for the fifth week
todefend the pockets of international waters between Pacific
Islandcountries - the Pacific Commons - as marine reserves (2) from
greedyfishing fleets intent on fishing out the world's last tuna
stocks - theworld's favourite fish. These motherships, known as
'reefers' are agateway for laundering tuna out of the region.
"Scientists have been warning for years that bigeye and
yellowfintuna are suffering from overfishing. This takes on a whole
new lightwhen you realise that secret catches haven't been included
in thesituation. Bigeye and yellowfin tuna are most probably in a
worsetrouble than scientists have predicted," continued Toribau.
"We need toact now and cut the fishing effort by half within the
waters of Pacificisland countries to save these fisheries."
60% of tuna eaten globally each year comes from the Pacific
headingmostly to markets in Japan, the European Union and United
States.
"Wecannot allow the fishing industry to destroy the last tuna
stocks.Greenpeace is asking supermarket retailers across the world
to stopselling unsustainable tuna products such as bluefin, bigeye
andyellowfin which are now threatened in all oceans. Retailers must
act asgatekeepers, ensuring that fish sold on their shelves is not
caught bypirates or originate from vessels that have transferred
catch at sea.Otherwise consumers could be complicit in purchasing
stolen goods fromthe Pacific or elsewhere," said Sari Tolvanen of
GreenpeaceInternational.
In the last month Greenpeace has taken action against
overfishingby Korean, Taiwanese and US boats and confiscated a fish
aggregationdevice (FAD) from the water that intensifies the
overfishing and alsofreed marine life from the hooks of a
long-liner.
Greenpeace advocates the creation of a network of marine
reserves,protecting 40 per cent of the world's oceans, as the long
term solutionto overfishing and the recovery of our overexploited
oceans.
Other contacts: Dean Baigent-Mercer, Communications officer on board the Esperanza: +872 324 469 014 (GMT + 11);John Novis, Photo Desk, London: +44 (0) 7801 615 889;Maarten van Rouveroy, Video Producer, Amsterdam: +31 (0) 20 718 2000Greenpeace International Press hotline: +31 (0) 20 7182470
Notes: (1) http://www.illegal-fishing.info/uploads/MRAGExtentGlobalIllegalFishing.pdf(2) http://www.greenpeace.org/pacific_marine_reserves_mapTo download images and footage of today's action and background vision go to:http://media.greenpeace.org.auusername: photospassword: greenEnter folder called "Defending Our Pacific".To download high resolution pictures, right click and "save image as".