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Int’l confab on fisheries opens
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Posted on Jul 27 2005
Some 250 fishermen, researchers, government officials and members of environmental non-government organizations from 26 countries converged in the port city of Yokohama, Japan, yesterday for the start of the joint International Fishers Forum and International Conference on Responsible Tuna Fisheries.
Yokohama Mayor Hiroshi Nakada opened the five-day joint conference, saying that Japan, being the biggest consumer market in the world for tuna, has the responsibility to protect these resources and establish their sustainable use.
The conference aims to discuss various issues important to tuna fisheries worldwide and to develop ways to address them.
One of the issues is declining fish stocks. Globally, skipjack and yellowfin tuna stocks are healthy, reported Robin Allen, director of the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission, as are southern albacore stocks and bluefin tuna stocks in the Pacific. However, albacore in the northern hemisphere, bigeye tuna in the Eastern Pacific, and Southern and Atlantic bluefin tuna are overexploited or nearly overexploited.
Another issue the conferees examined on Day 1 of the joint meeting was illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing activities and controlling the capacity of the worldwide tuna fleet.
According to Katsuma Hanafusa, counselor for the Fisheries Agency of Japan, some fishermen are driven to illegal, unreported and unregulated activities as a result of overcapacity.
The Tokyo-based OPRT and Honolulu-based Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council are co-hosting this international event with the support of fishery associations and the governments of Japan and the United States. For more information, visit www.oprt.or.jp or www.wpcouncil.org.
