The press release issued by the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council was hardly dispassionate. “U.S. Territories Ask for ‘Justice’ in Pacific Tuna Allocations,” read the headline on the notice, which described the council’s vote to allow Guam, Common¬wealth of the Northern Marianas, and American Samoa to assign up to 2,000 metric tons of their allotted share of Pacific bigeye tuna to the Hawai`i longline fleet – with the Hawai`i longliners not even having to fish in the islands’ territorial waters, much less land fish in their ports.
The vote taken was in support of adding an amendment to the council’s Fishery Management Plan for pelagic species (tunas and other open-ocean fish).
According to the press release, the decision was a matter of “justice” for the U.S. territories: “The 39 U.S. flagged, government-subsidized purse seiners harvest 6,500-8,000 metric tons of Pacific bigeye annually and have no [Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission] quota, while the 130 permitted U.S. longliners have a WCPFC quota of 3,763 metric tons of bigeye,” the press release stated.
During the meeting, several council members voiced righteous indignation over what was described as the unfair edge held by the purse seiners. Council vice chairman Manny Duenas of Guam may have been the most vocal on this point. “To me,” he said at one point, “the needs of the territories are always subservient to the needs of the purse seiners. The last 15 years of my life I’ve dedicated to anti-purse-seining.”
The press release took note of the $18 million paid each year by the U.S. government to island nations under the South Pacific Tuna Treaty, which expires in 2013. However, the $18 million is the only foreign aid that the United States provides to the South Pacific island nations that are party to the agreement. Owners of the purse seine vessels make additional payments, including the costs of observers. Their total payments to the treaty nations this year came to $5.7 million. (Hawai`i longliners pay nothing for observers – and in fact, are reimbursed their costs of providing observers with food and lodging each day at sea.)
According to the U.S. State Department, the landed value of the catches made by the U.S. purse seine fleet in 2008 came to $250 million. The ratio of government subsidies to the value of the catch is thus about 1 to 14 (a dollar of public funds for each 14 dollars in landed value of the catch – or seven cents on the dollar).
Compare that to the subsidies to the Hawai`i-based longline fleet. Under the most recent version of the fisheries appropriations bill (still moving through Congress at this writing), the National Marine Fisheries Service will be providing $7.1 million for the Hawaiian Longline Observer Program, $7.8 million for the Hawaiian sea turtle and incidental take activities (made necessary by the interactions of longliners with endangered and threatened sea turtles); and $1.5 million for the study and protection of whales in the Pacific. Even if part of that is discounted since it helps West Coast fisheries comply with the Endangered Species Act and other environmental laws, the total amount of public funds directed toward helping the Hawai`i longliners stay in business is on a scale similar to that provided to the purse seine fleet.
And when it comes to the ratio of subsidies to landed value of the catch, the public funds go a lot further with the purse seiners. According to NMFS data, the landed value of the Hawai`i longliners in 2007 amounted to $57 million. If the amount of subsidies for observers, turtle mitigation and whale research and protection is pegged conservatively at $12 million, the subsidy-to-economic activity ratio for the Hawai`i longline fleet is roughly 1 to 5 (20 cents per dollar of landed value of the catch).
In terms of the impact of the purse seiners’ catch on bigeye, the exact volume of bigeye taken in purse seines is not known. The juveniles are mixed in with the targeted yellowfin and skipjack and not tallied separately when catches are landed. The assessment of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission’s Conservation and Management Measure 2008-01, undertaken by John Hampton and Shelton Harley last summer, noted that even if purse seiners could modify their fishing methods to be more selective and avoid sets on small-size tuna, this “would likely be of only marginal benefit because of the high natural mortality rate of very small tuna.”
Volume 20, Number 6 December 2009