Hawaii angling
to preserve share
of Pacific tuna
A multinational council
By Gordon Y.K. Pang
aims to limit commercial and
recreational catches
Star-BulletinHawaii anglers are monitoring an international fisheries council meeting here this week to ensure that the local share of Pacific tuna remains available.
Delegates from 28 Pacific island and Pacific Rim nations are meeting at the Hawaii Convention Center to talk about the protection and management of Pacific tuna. Delegates hope all Pacific fishing areas will fall under an international agreement, overseen by a management commission, by June 2000.
Experts describe the central and western Pacific regions combined as the last-unexploited and largest tuna fishery in the world with annual landed value of $1.7 billion.
One of the first acts of a commission would be to review how much tuna commercial and recreational anglers have caught in the past and then set allowable catches based on those numbers.
Hawaii anglers attending this week's conference expressed concerns that a commission will allow international, distant-water boats to encroach on the state's 200-mile economic enterprise zone.
"One of my fears as a small boat fisherman is that too much importance will be placed on the industrial fishing fleets and not enough to the native, small-time, commercial or subsistence fisherman," said Waianae angler William Aila.
It's a concern not just of Hawaii anglers but those of other smaller island states such as Kiribati and the Federated States of Micronesia, Aila said.
Tom Webster, owner and captain of the long-line vessel Havana, has mixed feelings about the talks.
"I think in the long run it's going to be positive, it's preservation of our pelagic resources," Webster said. He added that humans have not had a good track record of managing natural resources.
On the other hand, "we have our own fisheries management master plans for pelagics," he said. "I think if we can continue these meetings on the basis of maintaining each of our (master plans), I think we're in pretty good shape. But to subjugate that to somebody else is a little uncomfortable to me."
Kitty Simonds, of the Hawaii-based Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, urged local anglers to report their catches to state and federal authorities so they can be allowed to catch the same amount of tuna they now take.
"If you don't report your catch, you might not get your allocation," Simonds said.
Delegates are looking specifically at four types of tuna: albacore (tombo); skipjack (aku); yellowfin (ahi); and bigeye (also ahi).
