For years, the standard response to concerns about overfishing in waters around Hawai’i has been: Don’t worry. None of the stocks managed by the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council has been designated as overfished except for some armorheads on seamounts way, way out in the ocean, which the U.S. fishery never targeted anyway, and some bottomfish, whose habitat lies mostly in state waters anyhow.
But the time when questions about the populations of the bread and butter of the longline fleet, the bigeye tuna, could be pooh-poohed has now gone the way of well, the bigeye tuna. For the first time ever, Hawai’i-based longline fishing vessels face the prospect that limits will be set on their catch of this high-value fish.
And unlike past regulations imposed on the fishery, the new regulations are not intended to save turtles, seabirds, marine mammals, or other animals that may be harmed in the normal course of fishing for tunas. Rather, they are being put in place to spare the bigeye itself, a target species.
“The health of stocks of bigeye is a matter of grave concern, especially in the Eastern Pacific,” says John Sibert of the Pelagic Fisheries Research Program at the University of Hawai’i. “It’s high time somebody dealt with the problem.”
Collapsing Recruitment
Commercially, the bigeye, Thunnus obesus, is the most important fish caught in Hawai’i. In some recent years, the number of bigeye caught by the Hawai’i longline fleet has been equal to or greater than catches of all other tunas combined. And for the last decade, the commercial value of the bigeye catch in Hawai’i has exceeded that for any other species, including swordfish, running about $20 million annually in the last few years.
Yet in the span of one year, the number of bigeye tuna landed in Hawai’i by the longline fleet dropped 25 percent from the historic high it reached in 2002, of roughly 140,847 fish, to just under 106,839 fish in 2003.
Not only in Hawai’i, but throughout the western and central Pacific, bigeye are showing signs of being overfished. That is the conclusion of a recent analysis of Pacific bigeye stocks conducted under the auspices of the Standing Committee on Tuna and Billfish, an organization affiliated with the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (a consortium of South Pacific states, including New Zealand and Australia). The overall population has not yet reached the level where its abundance is below the threshold that would define it as overfished, but, say the fisheries biologists who prepared the report, that is only because recruitment levels the rate at which the population has grown have been extraordinarily high lately. If recruitment rates return to average levels, they say, stocks will be pushed across the overfished threshold unless steps are taken to reduce fishing effort.
According to Sibert, those abnormally high recruitment levels are already failing. “We have no idea why the recruitment levels were so high. One would like to say it is related to ENSO” El Ni–o/Southern Oscillation “but we don’t really know. It’s all very confusing.”
The Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission, which regulates tuna fishing in waters from the west coast of the Americas west to 150 degrees W longitude (about 350 miles due east of the Big Island), agrees with the SCTB assessment. At an “extraordinary” meeting called by the IATTC last fall to deal with the problem, it called for a six-week ban on purse-seining, starting August 1, in an area around the equator where juvenile bigeye and yellowfin are disproportionately caught. In addition, the IATTC called on its member parties (including the United States) to limit this year’s catch of bigeye by longline vessels, including those based in Hawai’i, that fish in the Eastern Tropical Pacific to an amount no greater than that taken in 2001 a level that the National Marine Fisheries Service has said comes to about 100 metric tons (220,000 pounds, or roughly 3,000 fish). In mid-June, the IATTC met again and imposed even more stringent regulations, which, among other things, extended the longline catch limits through 2006.
‘The 1000-Pound Gorilla’
What has pushed bigeye tuna to the edge in the Pacific?
The short answer: More and bigger boats, chasing fewer fish with ever more efficient methods.
And while overfishing of stocks of large ocean fish is a new story in the Pacific, it’s an old one in the Atlantic Ocean, where every year since 1991, the catch of bigeye tuna has exceeded the estimate of the maximum sustainable yield the volume of fish that can be caught without damaging the stock’s ability to reproduce itself.
Recently, the Pacific populations of bigeye tuna have begun to experience the same type of fishing pressure. Historically, longline vessels have caught mature, deep-dwelling bigeye. Although longline catches of bigeye tuna represent just a small fraction of the total tuna catch, most of which is taken by purse seiners that feed the canneries, longline-caught bigeye have disproportionately high value, since they are consumed as sashimi in Japan and fresh fish elsewhere.
Over the last decade, though, purse seiners, setting on fish gathered around floating logs or fish-aggregating devices rather than dolphins, have caught increasing numbers of juvenile bigeye tuna along with the skipjack and yellowfin tuna that are the mainstay of the canneries. In addition, hundreds of new purse seiners were launched by nations that historically had little or no large-scale catch of tunas.
The character of the overall bigeye catch shifted from a relatively few, mature fish with high value, to large numbers of low-value juvenile fish. Furthermore, the actual catches of bigeye may be far more substantial than the estimates; juvenile bigeyes are often easily confused with juvenile yellowfin, and the two fish often are found together in shallow schools targeted by the purse seiners.
One of the best indicators of the abundance of fish is the catch-per-unit effort, or CPUE . For longline vessels, the standard unit of reference is 1,000 hooks, so CPUE refers to the number of fish caught for each 1,000 hooks dropped in the water. CPUE for longline-caught bigeye have been declining since the 1970s, according to the Pelagic Fisheries Research Program. Longline vessels targeting tuna in waters under the Western Pacific Council’s jurisdiction had a bigeye CPUE of 6.1 fish per 1,000 hooks in 1998; 4.4 in 1999; and 3.8 in 2000, according to a 2003 report issued by the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
Under one population model, the PFRP said in a 2003 report, the maximum sustainable yield of bigeye “may be somewhat less than the maximum observed longline catch, leading to the conclusion that the stock of large bigeye exploited by longliners is at least fully exploited, and possibly over-exploited.”
Yet the Standing Committee on Tuna and Billfish stops short of describing the bigeye in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean as overfished; “the stock is not yet in an overfished state because of high levels of recruitment since 1990,” the SCTB found in its 2003 assessment of tunas.
With that extraordinarily recruitment dropping to average or below-average levels, however, the consequences of unrestricted fishing could be dire, especially if the number of longliners plying the Pacific continues to grow. “The scary thing is if China increases its longline fleet,” says Dalzell of the Western Pacific Council. “China is the real 1000-pound gorilla.” If its middle-class should develop a taste for sashimi, the results could be disastrous, he told Environment Hawai’i.
Regulatory Regime Shift
Since June, there’s been a new kid on the block when it comes to managing all tunas in the Pacific: the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission, or WCPFC. The commission was years in the making, with initial efforts dating back to the mid-1990s. By December 19, 2003, it had been ratified by 13 states south of 20¡N latitude, and under terms of the convention agreed to by member countries, the commission became operative six months later June 19, 2004. Member nations include all Pacific coastal states of Asia and the United States, although the Senate has not yet ratified the convention. The commission, “if implemented, will change the way fisheries are managed in the Pacific forever,” says Sibert. “It’s a real breakthrough.”
Generally, the commission is intended to take whatever steps are necessary to make sure that in the area of its jurisdiction highly migratory species, such as tunas and billfish, are not taken at levels that jeopardize their long-term sustainability. Already it faces an uphill battle: at an April meeting of the WCPFC preparatory conference, Japan alleged that at least one member nation had breached all past resolutions calling for restraint in any expansion of fishing capacity or effort in the convention area generally, the Pacific Ocean west of 150¡W longitude all the way to the Indian Ocean.
The chief offender, according to Japan, is Taiwan. It leads the pack of Asian nations in number of registered purse seiners (38 as of June 2003, with Japan coming in second with 34 registered purse seiners). When Taiwanese-owned but foreign-registered purse seiners are included, Japan alleged, the total number of purse seiners in the Taiwanese fleet rises to at least 66, with still more reportedly under construction in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. What’s more, the new Taiwanese “super seiners” can take many times more tuna than older, smaller boats up to 20,000 tons a year.
Japan also analyzed Taiwanese-owned longline vessels and found similar results: in June 2003, the registered Taiwanese longliners numbered 210, with at least 40 more flying flags of convenience. And while other nations’ longline catch of bigeye tuna decreased from 2002 to 2003, that of Taiwan alone rose.
Shark Viewing Tours Come Under Fire
Sharks may never see their public image rise to the warm and fuzzy status of dolphins. Still, their reputation has been climbing steadily upward since the menacing nadir it reached in the movie “Jaws.”
Exploiting the sharks’ newfound popularity, as well as contributing to it, is the relatively new industry of shark-viewing, in which tourists, protected by strong metal cages, are dropped into shark-infested waters for an up-close and personal look at these top predators, drawn to the cages by chum.
Hawai’i has banned any feeding of sharks in state waters, but two operators based in Haleiwa manage to circumvent the ban by taking passengers out three miles from shore. There they chum the water, attracting sandbar and Galapagos sharks for the most part, with an occasional tiger or whale shark passing by as well.
The experience thrills tourists. To no less degree, it has angered fishers, surfers, and paddlers, many of whom believe that the shark-viewing operations have drawn more of the animals to the waters they frequent and, to that extent, have added to the inherent dangers of their own activities.
Their concerns were expressed by Ed Ebisui, an attorney and member of the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council, at the council’s 123rd meeting in June. “There are three to four popular surfing and paddling spots directly inshore of the shark-viewing site,” he said. “Some watermen say they’ve noticed more sharks in the area” since the shark-viewing operations began. Night-time akule fishermen in the area also have told Ebisui they’ve been having a lot more interactions, he added.
And the two operations in Haleiwa may be just the start, warned Walter Ikehara of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Division of Aquatic Resources. “I shudder to think” that more such operations may begin, Ikehara told the council. Recently, he said, “I’ve taken calls from guys in Colorado wanting to know how to set up” a shark-cage business.
Judson Feder, general counsel for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the southwest region, was asked if the shark-chumming could be regulated under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Management and Conservation Act. “It’s not fishing,” Feder responded, suggesting it would be a stretch for such operations to come under the council’s jurisdiction, as delimited by the act.
But Dave Itano, a fisheries biologist with the Pelagic Fisheries Research Program, commented that while shark-viewing and chumming isn’t a fishing operation in the normal sense, it might still be subject to regulation under the Magnuson Act as an activity that has an impact on marine safety. And if such operations increase, the implications for safety of other ocean users will be even greater, Itano said. (The act contains a series of “national standards” for fishery management and conservation; National Standard 10 states that “conservation and management measures shall, to the extent practicable, promote the safety of human life at sea.”) “These guys are making money,” Itano said. “Tourists really like it All of a sudden, you might have 12 operations, 15 operations across the state.”
George Krasnick, a consultant who often works for the council, offered his view that the state could regulate shark-viewing operations even if they conduct their business outside state waters. “This isn’t a Magnuson issue,” Krasnick said. “The state can prevent these boats from berthing” at state harbors. “If the state has concerns, it can take charge of the issue” by such means, he said.
But Steve Thompson, who until last month was acting administrator of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation, disagreed. His division, he said, allows the vessels only to load and unload passengers in return for their payment of a percentage of gross revenues or a minimum rent, whichever is higher. What they do and where they go with those passengers is entirely out of his division’s jurisdiction, he said.
Swordfishing Resumes
Fishing boats based in Honolulu are once again setting their lines for swordfish in waters of the North Pacific. Following more than four years of closure, the swordfish fishery reopened in May under new rules intended to reduce harm to endangered sea turtles. Among other things, the new rules cap fishing effort at a level of no more than 2,120 “sets” a year. That number is roughly half of the total annual sets made for swordfish during most of the 1990s.
The allotment was shared among the 120 longline permit holders who indicated their interest in participating this year in the swordfish fishery. (There are a total of 164 permit holders; in 2003, 110 of them were active.) Each permittee requesting an allotment was given 17 certificates, each good for one deployment, or set, of line. (A set generally consists of about 2,000 hooks arrayed along a mainline that can be up to 60 miles long.) Beginning in November, the National Marine Fisheries Service will start the allotment process for 2005.
Paul Dalzell, a fisheries biologist with the council, noted that although the initial distribution of the set certificates was only to longline permit holders, there was no restriction on who might purchase them should they come on the open market, setting up the prospect of conservation groups purchasing certificates as a means of reducing impacts of the fishery on turtles and other rare animals.
Jim Cook of Pacific Ocean Producers and the trade group Hawai’i Longline Association said he did not know of any certificates being traded yet, although he noted it was still early in the year for swordfish fishing. “As we get a little closer to the fall, then maybe we’ll see a little more action” in the trade of certificates, he added.
Rules of Engagement
Under the new rules for the swordfish fishery, observers must be present on all vessels targeting swordfish. In addition, there is a “hard” limit on interactions with turtles, with no more than 16 leatherback interactions and 17 loggerhead interactions allowed each year. An interaction occurs any time a loggerhead or leatherback comes into contact with fishing gear, regardless of whether the animal is injured, uninjured, or killed, said Dalzell. Once the limit is reached, the swordfish fishery has seven days to close down until the start of a new year.
The swordfish fishery’s limits on turtle interactions are separate from those set for the longline tuna fishery. In the latter case, the limit on interactions with turtles is set at 18 leatherbacks and 4 loggerheads; if that so-called incidental take limit is exceeded, the only immediate consequence is the re-initiation of consultation. Under the Endangered Species Act, consultation entails an evaluation of the impacts of a federally sanctioned activity (longline fishing for tuna, in this case) on a listed endangered or threatened species. No boats would be prevented from fishing while the consultation was in progress. Consultation may be reinitiated under several other conditions as well for example, if additional information comes to light on the status of protected species, or on the proportion of injured or entangled turtles that eventually die as a result.
Are Whales The New Turtles?
Just when longline operators thought their bycatch problems had been solved with reopening of the swordfish fishery, a new threat looms on the horizon: false killer whales.
The Marine Mammal Protection Act requires that the National Marine Fisheries Service determine the impact of each commercial fishery on marine mammals. If the impact is low, it is placed in Category III; if the fishery results in the death or serious injury of up to half the level of loss that NMFS decides the population can suffer without irreversible decline, it is placed in Category II; finally, if the fishery leads to death or injury of more than half of that level of loss, it is placed in Category I. Fisheries placed in Categories I and II are subject to regulation and plans of action intended to reduce the marine mammal injuries associated with the fishery.
Last November, Earthjustice sued NMFS, seeking to have the Hawai’i longline fishery placed in Category I because of the level of injury it inflicts on Hawai’i’s population of false killer whales, Pseudorca crassidens. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit are Hui Malama I Kohola, the Center for Biological Diversity, and Turtle Island Restoration Network. At the time of the lawsuit, the Hawai’i longline fishery was in Category III.
“For years, NMFS has illegally ignored its own data, which show that the Hawai`i-based longline fleet is injuring and killing false killer whales at nearly 20 times the level the population can sustain,” Earthjustice attorney David Henkin said when the lawsuit was filed. He noted that NMFS’ own stock assessment report for false killer whales had found that human activity could injure or kill no more than 0.8 animals each year, on average, without putting the Hawai’i population of false killer whales at risk. The actual number of false killer whales that the longline fishery kills or injures each year is seven, or almost nine times the level of loss that NMFS says the population can sustain.
In spring of 2004, U.S. District Judge Samuel King dismissed the case, based on statements by NMFS officials that the agency was re-evaluating the “Level of Fishery” (LOF) of the Honolulu longline fishery and would soon publish proposed regulations that would be more protective of the whales. Those regulations, which would elevate the longline fishery to Category I, were published in April but as of early July, no final regulation has been issued. In the meantime, Earthjustice has appealed Judge King’s decision to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco; opening briefs are due next month.
— Patricia Tummons
Volume 15, Number 2 August 2004