South Pacific Tuna Corporation (SPTC) has announced that it will be reducing its tuna purse seiners by more than half the number of its 14 US-flagged vessels. By the end of the year,...
Fishing
A Stop To Trickery Of Chartering Vessels Evading IO Yellowfin Quota
The Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) has decided to put rules in place that should end the practice of chartering of seiners to utilize them as temporary transfer to...
Flywire Wants To Turn E-Monitoring Into A Profit Boosting Technology
On-board electronic monitoring can be more beneficial for fishermen than they think. The founders of the American company Flywire Cameras, Jacob Isaac-Lowery, and Sarah Alessi,...
IOTC Closes Loopholes On Deployed And Active FADs
Several major loopholes in the IOTC regulations on FADs that were exploited by several fleets have been closed. Following a Seychelles’ proposal to tighten the management of FADs,...
Fisherman Drowns Trying To Catch Tuna
A fisherman in Axim, Ghana drowned after the canoe he was in crashed when trying to catch a big tuna. Four other men were also in the small boat. After it was hooked, the large...
What Are The Consequences Of Yellowfin Decline For Indian Ocean FIPs?
Two weeks ago when the 23rd Indian Ocean Tuna Commission Annual Meeting held in Hyderabad, India, failed to produce concrete measures for the overfished yellowfin...
EU Lifts Taiwan’s Yellow Card On IUU
The reforms Taiwan has taken over the last three and a half years to fight illegal fishing have worked out. Recently, the European commission (EC) decided to lift...
FFA Countries Endorse Minimum Working Conditions For Foreign Vessels
The battle against inhumane working conditions of crews on boats in the Pacific Ocean has moved forward. The Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) members have backed a...
China Moves To High-Latitude Bluefin Fishing
In a festive ceremony, the prospective boat owner Zhong Shui Group Ocean Shipping Co. Ltd. announced the building of two 58 meter longliners for high-latitude fishing. The...
Princes Calls For Emergency Session On IO Yellowfin
In an interesting development, tuna company Princes has asked for an emergency meeting of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) to agree on an effective rebuilding...
“Stop Buying Yellowfin”. Can The IO Tuna Industry Weather This Storm?
The management of the yellowfin population by the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) has many stakeholders seeing red, especially in the past week. Several groups including NGOs and the...
PNG Losing Out Because Of Climate Change
Papua New Guinea’s fishery industry claimed that they are losing out because climate conditions in the Western Pacific are driving fish away from its waters. According to the country’s...
Somalia Seeking Chinese Investors For Indian Ocean Processing Hub
Somalia is looking to increase its seafood exports from its tuna rich Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and surrounding Indian Ocean waters to global markets, particularly to China. In...
Albacore Longliners In Port Transshipments Validated
Cook Islands’ longline vessels transshipment activity is fully in compliance with all fishery laws and regulations, according to the nation’s Ministry of Marine Resources (MMR). The...
Spain Wants To Modernize Tuna Fleet With EU Fisheries Fund
Spain aims to utilize the future European Fisheries Fund to modernize its vessels. The average age of the entire fishing fleet is 32 years and more than 2,500 boats have been in...
International Day Of The Seafarer Spotlights Tuna Crews
“Today, ninety percent of everything we need to survive and do business with is transported by sea. But none of this is possible without the brave men and women keeping the industry aloft –...
El Niño Expected To Continue To Affect Fishing This Summer
The latest update of the US-based Climate Prediction Center (CPC) confirms that oceanic and atmospheric conditions were consistent with El Niño during the month of May. El Niño...
Odd Visa System Keeps Hawaii Longliner Crew Stuck On Board
About 700 foreign crew members working on US longliners operating from Hawaii are condemned to stay in the pier area of Honolulu port when their vessels are docked. An odd visa...
IOTC’s Measures On Yellowfin “Not Ambitious Enough”
Stakeholders have expressed their displeasure with the management measures taken by the IOTC on yellowfin stock quota management at an annual meeting held by the Commission last...
13 NGOs Demand 100% Monitoring On Entire Industrial Tuna Fleet
There are no longer credible reasons to delay 100 percent on-board monitoring of fishing vessels, according to 13 Environmental NGOs involved in global tuna conservation. They call on Regional...