Cooks first to set longline catch limits

Cooks first to set longline catch limits

The Cook Islands has become the first Pacific Island nation to adopt a quota management system (QMS) for its longline fishery to control catches of albacore and bigeye tuna.

The Marine Resources (Large Pelagic Longline Fishery and Quota Management System) Regulations 2016 approved by Cabinet and the Executive Council last week, mark a significant step forward in allowing the Cook Islands to commit to a catch limit agreed to among Pacific Island countries through the Tokelau Arrangement for the Management of the South Pacific Longline Fishery and harvest strategy regulations being developed by the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC). A fishery based on catch limits under a QMS is a management system that is globally regarded as best practice for commercial fisheries, and is supported by international environmental groups, including WWF.

“We have received strong support regionally for taking the lead on transitioning from an effort-based system to a QMS. The focus is to restructure and control the longline fishery to meet our commitment to work with other States to ensure effective conservation and management of albacore and bigeye stocks,” says MMR Secretary Ben Ponia.

“We are hoping this system will be adopted throughout the Pacific region. The Cook Islands can now set a precedent as one of the significant longline albacore fisheries in the region, and one of the few with a bigeye fishery,” says Ponia.

Development of the QMS has been a collaborative effort with the New Zealand Ministry of Primary Industries, the Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) and the Pacific Community (SPC), taking several years to bring to fruition. The Tokelau Arrangement nations (Cook Islands, Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, Niue, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu) proposed to rein in catch and effort levels in the South Pacific albacore fishery, after SPC predicted fishing at current levels had a high risk of pushing albacore stocks over the edge in the next 20 years. Under the FFA Future of Fisheries Roadmap, Forum leaders have committed to replacing effort controls (access fees) on fishing with catch-based (quota) systems within 10 years.

Electronic monitoring and electronic reporting at sea are key technological advances that will make the QMS possible. The Cook Islands has one of the most well-managed longline fisheries in the region, with historically high levels of observer coverage and verification of catches. MMR believes the QMS will promote transparency and availability of catch data and limits. Fisheries Observers are placed on longline vessels to collect independent data on fishing activity. The Cook Islands now aims to increase observer coverage to 20 per cent of sea days.

Offshore Fisheries Division Director Tim Costelloe says, “It is important for us to increase the data from all fishing operations to a minimum of 20 per cent, to make the available data statistically relevant for management planning. We can do this by a combination of increasing the number of Observers on the boats, and with our implementation of Electronic Monitoring using cameras on the vessels to increase the level of coverage even further.”

Replacing the 2012 regulations, which were based on set license fees for domestic and foreign longline fishing vessels, the 2016 QMS regulations sets out a total allowable catch (TAC) and total allowable commercial catch (TACC) for albacore and bigeye tuna for each calendar year from 1 January. The albacore TAC has been set at 9750 metric tonnes, well below the peak catch of 10,680 tonnes caught in 2012. The TAC for bigeye tuna will be 3500 tonnes under the regulations. In addition to license fees, fishing vessels will now pay $250 per tonne of quota for albacore and bigeye and each vessel will be assigned a minimum catch quota.

The Cook Islands tuna fishery has typically consisted of longline vessels targeting South Pacific Albacore servicing the canneries of Pago Pago and Apia. A small domestic fresh fish fleet operates out of Rarotonga, supplying the local market and some foreign exports. Locally based fishing vessels are exempted from purchasing a minimum quota mix.

The most recent stock assessment on South Pacific Albacore was conducted in 2015 by the Pacific Community’s Oceanic Fisheries Program (OFP) and concluded that overfishing is not occurring and the stock is currently not overfished.

The total catch of albacore from longlining within the Cook Islands in 2015 was 3,271 metric tonnes. The 2015 Western Central Pacific Fisheries Convention Area (WCPF-CA) catch of South Pacific albacore was 68,594mt.

Bigeye tuna stock status is of particular concern and is a key species caught in both the longline (as valuable adults) and purse seine fishery (mostly as juvenile).

The most recent stock assessment on bigeye tuna was conducted in 2014 by the Pacific Community’s OFP and concluded that bigeye tuna is currently overfished and overfishing is occurring.

The total catch of bigeye in the Cook Islands in 2015 was 517 tonnes in the longline fishery and 96 tonnes in the purse seine fishery. The Western Central Pacific Fisheries Convention Area (WCPF-CA) catch of bigeye was 134,084mt. Approximately 48,700mt of bigeye was taken in the purse seine fishery and 64,000mt in the longline fishery.

The Cook Islands currently has a maximum limit of 50 longline vessels licensed to fish within the Cook Islands EEZ at any one time.

MMR remains committed to best practice precautionary management of stocks inside the Cook Islands EEZ through its mandate under the Marine Resources Act 2005 to ensure the stocks remain healthy, and to maximize ecological and economic benefit for the people of the Cook Islands long term.—ENDS

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