Pacific fisheries

As the Pacific nations have taken a greater part in the fisheries sector in the region there has been a substantial increase in reporting required by the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission.

The Commission's Technical and Compliance Committee is meeting this week in Majuro and our correspondent there, Giff Johnson, says the burden from a lack of capacity is a key issue being raised.

The exercise, the third this year and called Operation Island Chief, aimed to detect, deter, report and/or apprehend potential illegal, unregulated or unreported fishing activity.

Using boats and aircraft it covered more than 16.5 million square kilometres of ocean and found no infringements or breaches.

The Pacific's 10 Forum Fisheries Agency member nations were involved, along with Australia, New Zealand, France and the United States.

The comments come as the annual meeting of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission, or Tuna Commission, takes place in Pasay City in the Philippines.

The FFA's director-general, James Movick, said it was too early to tell how much fish could be caught on the high seas and action needed to be taken to ensure the rest of the world held off on overfishing.

The PNA is made up of eight countries, plus Tokelau, and controls much of the Pacific's tuna resources.

It has taken an aggressive approach and in seven years increased revenue eight fold.

The PNA intends maintaining this drive but the chief executive Ludwig Kumoru says they also wanted to improve links with organisations like the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission and the Pacific Forum Fisheries agency.

 This was the focus of IFC’s new research, which was presented at the Harbor Project Development Conference, hosted by the Solomon Islands Government.

IFC Senior Operations Officer, Dina Nicholas, said, “What we are seeing in the Pacific generally is that the fisheries industry only employs about 1 percent of its workforce locally. Only 10 percent of the catch is processed locally.”