A STORY posted on Fishupdate last Friday on how environmentalists have called for expansion of a ban on longlines to protect sea turtles has drawn reaction from the US Western Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Council.
The Council says the The Sea Turtle Restoration Project (STRP)statement tells only part of the story about the 2005 Biological Opinion on the Hawaii-based pelagic, deep-set, tuna longline fishery. Left out, the council claims, are “essential facts” that will put the STRP's “alarmist claims” in proper perspective.
The sea turtle grouping claims that, despite a tripling in the number of critically endangered leatherback sea turtles killed by the Hawaiian tuna longline industry in just one year, the US Government continues to exempt the industry from using new circle hooks and time and area closures in the Pacific.The environmentalists want to expand the ban on longlines along the west coast of the US to the rest of the US Pacific as well as the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico and contend that this exemption has been deadly for sea turtles.
But the fisheries management council says that based on statistical analysis and current information, the 2005, BiOp concluded that the continued existence of all sea turtle species, including leatherbacks, is not jeopardised by the continued operation of the deep-set component of the Hawaii-based longline fishery. Meanwhile turtle interactions by the deep-set longline tuna fishery are less frequent than with the shallow-set longline swordfish fishery.Moreover, while circle hooks have been found effective as a turtle mitigation technique for the swordfish fishery, they have been found to be less effective for the tuna fishery. Therefore, only the swordfish fishery is required to use circle hooks, although many tuna fishermen voluntarily use them. However, both fisheries must maintain daily logbooks that record interactions with protected species, have observers onboard (100 percent coverage for the swordfish fishery and 25 percent coverage for the tuna fishery), employ sea turtle handling measures specified by the National Marine Fisheries Service(NMFS), carry and use NMFS approved turtle de-hooking devices, and attend annual protected species workshops.
Olive ridley sea turtle populations that nest in the Eastern
Pacific, the stock that interacts with the Hawaii longline
fishery, is increasing at a rate of 12 percent annually,
the Council contends. And perhaps, they say, there were more interactions in the deep-set fishery in 2004 with Olive Ridley turtles because there are more turtles.
Interestingly, however, there has only been one Olive Ridley
interaction in the first three quarters of 2005, the Council point out. The point being that long-term data sets are necessary to quantify trends and impacts.
The STRP advocates a longline moratorium. But the reality, says the council, is that global consumer demand for pelagic resources exists, and longlining and purse-seining are the two fishing methods that are meeting the majority of that demand. The real challenge is not to shut down longline fishing but to unite the industry and others interested in our pelagic marine resources to find and implement effective solutions to avoid protected species interactions and to ensure healthy stocks of tuna and billfish.Successful mitigation measures must provide incentives for use while significantly reducing or eliminating interactions without making fishing operations difficult or unprofitable.
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Should fisheries be closed during breeding time to allow stocks to reach more sustainable levels?
